Heaven's Door
by MistressNobody
Summary: *Reposted* Cas is missing, and Dean & Sam are on a weird hunt that only gets stranger when they find the angel. One problem: Cas is a baby! Sam's not sure whether to be amused over Dean's mothering skills or not, while they try to find a cure. Rated mostly for bad language.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Reposted, because FF staff took it down due to me using a swear word in the summary. **

**Disclaimer: I do not own the characters or anything recognizably _Supernatural_ related, and am not profiting off this story. It was written purely for my own entertainment.**

* * *

_It is way too early in the morning for this shit. _Dean threw an arm over his eyes as he laid in bed and let out a heart-felt groan. He didn't even have to look to know that Sam was giving him an _epic _bitchface just at that moment.

"Dude," Sam whined. "You know that it's important." Dean didn't make any move to get up.

"Sammy…" He was coming very close to begging, as much of a hit to his man-card as that would be. "It's a freakin' _plane_! You know I hate planes!" Sam huffed out an annoyed breath, which only made Dean move his arm and glare him down.

"We don't have a _choice_, Dean." Sam insisted. _Oh dear God._ Sam had pulled out the puppy-eyes. "We have to get to Los Angeles as soon as possible; it would take too long to drive from this far away." Dean glared at his little brother some more. _I know that, Bitch._ At Dean's continued silence, Sam rolled his eyes. "Look, the only other option would be to ask Cas to zap us there." Dean finally sat up, rubbing his fingers wearily over his eyes.

"I've tried that, man." He said, resignation and hints of worry in his voice. "The damn feather duster won't come when I call." Dean saw the worry leak into Sam's eyes, and knew what he was thinking. Cas _always _came when Dean called for him… It was their 'profound bond', as Cas had termed it once. If he wasn't answering, there had to be something wrong. "Maybe we should be figuring out where the hell Cas is, instead of flying to L.A." Dean figured you couldn't blame him for trying, but Sam was already shaking his stupid shaggy head.

"We promised Olivia we'd help her out right away." He argued. "We owe her for all the times she helped Dad." Dean pushed to his feet grumpily, tossing his clothes into his duffel.

"You are _so_ buying me a bottle of Jack after we get off the damn plane." He didn't have to turn around to know that Sam was grinning in victory.

"Fine." Sam smirked.

"Bitch." Dean threw over his shoulder as he pulled on a clean t-shirt.

"Jerk."

* * *

Olivia Reynolds was an interesting kind of woman. Everything about her at first glance screamed 'normal housewife', but once you got a peek under the surface she had the ability to kind of scare the shit out you. Or, at least, she had the ability to scare the shit out of Sam. She could bake pie and host little tea parties like the best of the Stepford Wives, but she could also wield a shotgun like a maniac when it came to protecting her kids. It was like watching a mama-bear on crack, if Olivia thought something was a threat to her family. _Scary._

The boys had gone to her ritzy place in L.A. to help out with a nasty werewolf problem. It had seemed like an odd end of town for werewolves to crop up, but after all of his years in the 'family business' Sam had stopped being surprised by a lot of things. He knew that Dean was still pissed about having to resort to flying there in a plane, but they hadn't really had a choice. After all of the times that Olivia had bailed John out of jail and fronted him money when the usual hustle hadn't provided, the boys owed it to her to help out. The werewolf hunt had gone like any other… at first. The boys had been congratulating each other with a beer for a job well done, when Olivia's youngest had thrown a wrench into their good mood.

"You can't leave!" Little Suzy had screamed when Dean had mentioned about hitting the road. Olivia had even looked shocked by the outburst; normally Suzy was a quiet kid. "If you leave, he'll be all alone!" She had insisted, bursting into tears. The sentence had struck Sam as being odd, sure… But he hadn't paid _too_ much attention. Dean, however, had been hooked.

"Who'll be alone?" He had asked the little girl, after crouching down to her level. It freaked Sam out sometimes how naturally good Dean was with kids, until he remembered that Dean had practically raised _him_ as well. Suzy had fisted her tiny fingers into Dean's flannel shirt, as if she could stop him from leaving that way. Sam and Olivia shared a confused glance.

"The lost one!" Suzy said in answer to Dean's question, though it wasn't exactly an enlightening one. Sam was either going brain-dead, or Dean was just catching on a lot more quickly to what the little girl was getting at, because Dean's face finally lit with understanding and trepidation.

"Sammy…" He said lowly, his voice a bit hoarse. "What do you figure the odds are of a completely random werewolf outbreak happening in L.A., around the home of an old friend of Dad's, which would naturally bring _us _here?" Sam frowned, still not getting what Dean was really asking.

"What's going on, man?" He asked, glad to note that Olivia was still just as confused as he was. Dean turned back to Suzy.

"The 'lost one'?" He asked her. She nodded her head miserably, and Dean turned back to Sam. "What are the odds, Sammy, of us being brought to the city of _Lost Angels_?" Sam's eyes blew wide as he finally got where Dean was going with it.

"Oh… Crap." Was all that he could say. Dean laid a hand comfortingly on Suzy's shoulder, encouraging the little girl to tell him all.

"Suzy, honey… Do you know where the 'lost one' is? We don't want to leave him alone… Actually, we've been wondering where he is for awhile." He said to her in a soft voice, but Sam could hear the epic amounts of worry behind it. _Just what the hell has happened to you, Cas?_

Suzy began tugging on Dean's shirt, pulling him along to her room at the top of the stairs. Sam briefly noted the massive amounts of pink in the room, but was more confused on just where Castiel was supposed to be… there was no scruffy man in a wrinkled trench coat in the centre of the room. Suzy pointed Dean towards a small pile of clothing that was half-wedged behind a dresser, and moved to stand beside her mother. Dean slowly approached the pile, but froze to a dead stop when he apparently saw what was nestled within it.

* * *

_Holy shit._

Dean stared down at the pile of pink and purple clothing on the floor, hardly believing what he was seeing. Nestled comfortably in the centre of the clothes was a tiny naked figure, which at first glance Dean would have thought to be a six-month-old kid. But the unruly black hair and creepily wise blue eyes told him who it really was.

"…Cas?" He asked in disbelief. Dean didn't know how it had happened, but somehow his angelic friend had been turned into a child. And had also somehow conveniently ended up at the home of John's friend, where they would find him. The little figure blinked up at Dean knowingly, which was just weird considering how young he _looked_, and raised his arms in a silent request to be picked up. _Okay, this shit is officially Twilight Zone worthy._

Without really thinking about it, Dean gently picked Cas up from his little nest of clothes and held him awkwardly. Cas stared at him for a long moment, and even though he didn't speak, Dean somehow knew exactly what he wanted. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, Dean laid Cas in his lap and tugged off his flannel over-shirt. Buttoning the shirt onto the toddler-like form, he rolled up the sleeves as far as possible so that Cas' little hands were free to move. Obviously pleased with being somewhat clothed, Cas fisted a tiny hand in Dean's t-shirt to get his attention.

"You're not like a normal baby, are you?" Dean said, more like a statement than a question. He got the sense that Cas agreed with him, though. "You can think like always, but you can't talk?" Again, that overwhelming sense that Cas agreed. "It wasn't a coincidence that we were drawn here, right? Then how…?" Cas reached one chubby little hand up, and fisted it around the amulet hanging from Dean's neck.

"It was God…" Sam almost-whispered. "God made sure we came to him?" Dean nodded his head, sensing that was the right answer from Cas. Standing up, Dean instinctively cradled the small form to his chest.

"We've got to figure out what the hell happened to him, man." He said in a hard voice, before turning to leave the room. Olivia looked pretty dumfounded, and Dean couldn't really blame her… it wasn't every day that a bad-ass nerd angel of the Lord suddenly appeared in your kid's room as a toddler.

They decided the best thing for figuring out what the hell was going on with mini-Cas was to bring him back to Bobby's in Sioux Falls. This had led to an awkward one-sided conversation between Dean and Cas as to whether or not he'd be able to just zap them to Bobby's… And the brunt of frustrated anger that had suddenly overwhelmed Dean's senses gave him the answer that no, Cas wasn't capable of it in that form. _Oh joy… Another airplane ride._

Olivia had bought the tickets for them as a 'thank you' for the werewolf help, and had offered to get them some toddler-sized clothes for Cas. Sam had thought this was a great idea, but they had quickly found out that the stubborn angel didn't want to wear anything that wasn't Dean's shirt. Dean secretly figured that might've had something to do with the fact that Olivia had picked out some pretty cutesy-looking crap… Just because the poor guy _looked_ like a kid, didn't mean that he _was_ one. Dean had snagged a pair of jeans out of the pile and forced Cas into them so that he at least had something covering his legs. If they were gonna be taking him on a plane ride, he didn't need any lectures from other people about not clothing 'his' kid properly.

"Um…" Sam started hesitantly, as they were just reaching their plane seats. "Are we gonna need to get… you know, _stuff_ for him?" Dean blinked in confusion, which made Sam roll his eyes. "You know, like diapers and stuff." Cas' little head whipped in Sam's direction at that one, and Dean sensed pure indignant outrage coming from his small form. His little blue eyes were clearly conveying _I will smite the shit out of you_.

"Dude… No. Just, no." Dean said, trying not to chuckle for Cas' sake. Taking his seat at the plane's window, he settled Cas comfortably in his lap. Sam sat down quietly, but the quiet didn't last long.

"How d'you know?" He asked, voice reeking of curiosity. Dean shifted uncomfortably at that.

"I can just… feel it, okay?" Cas turned his head to look up at Dean, seeming to be both grateful and uncomfortable at the same time. Dean figured he'd probably be feeling the same way if he was suddenly reduced to little more than a powerless child. _Speaking of 'powerless'…_ Turning to look directly at Cas, he whispered so as not to be overheard by the other passengers. "Cas… How much of your angel mojo do you still have?" Cas blinked up at him, but seemed to be considering the question with his usual seriousness. Once again, Cas' frustration overwhelmed Dean's senses. "So that little, huh?" He said, feeling bad for the guy. Of course, that was when the stewardess came by.

"Aww! What a sweet little guy!" The curvy brunette cooed, bending over Sam to look at Cas. Dean couldn't help but smirk.

"Yeah… He's a little angel." He said, and immediately felt Cas' exasperation in return. The stewardess reached out her hands, seemingly intending to pick Cas up, which he apparently did _not_ like. Cas leaned away from her, fisting his little hands in Dean's t-shirt and looking at the woman stubbornly. She only smiled in return.

"What a little cutey… Doesn't want to leave his daddy, huh?" And didn't _that_ sentence make Dean feel fuckin' weird. "What's his name?" She asked, throwing Dean sex-eyes. Which only turned him off a little, to be honest… For all she knew, he could have a wife somewhere. He shook off the odd thoughts and cleared his throat to answer her.

"Cas… His name's Cas." Of course, the _last_ time Dean had said that, he was introducing adult-Cas to a hooker named 'Chastity'. _This is so messed up. _Dean made non-committal answers to the rest of her babbling, feeling more and more uncomfortable, until she was pulled away to actually do her job. Sam was looking at him like a _bitch_, seemingly accusing Dean of flirting with the stewardess.

"Dude..." Dean said sternly. "She was getting fucking _creepy_, don't give me that look." Cas gripped a tiny hand around Dean's pinky finger, assuring him that he understood Dean hadn't been interested. "Glad to know _someone _believes me." Dean bitched, while looking down at Cas. He caught the weirded-out look on Sam's face. "What?" He practically snarled at his little brother.

"How do you know what Cas is thinking?" Sam asked. Dean shifted uncomfortably again.

"I _told _you, man! I can just... sense it, or feel it, or whatever." He replied a little defensively. Sam twitched an eyebrow at that, but left it alone since the engines for the airplane had started up.

Dean swallowed nervously, and went to clamp his hands down on the arm rests, but stopped mid-motion when he realized that would leave Cas with nothing to hold him down. Cradling the small body to his chest, Dean concentrated instead on not squeezing Cas to death out of fright. The plane started to bounce and jostle as it moved down the runway, and Dean could feel himself breaking out into a cold sweat. Suddenly, his fear seemed to... evaporate. Dean glanced down at Cas, to realize that the angel had placed one of his little hands on Dean's arm, directly over where the handprint rested beneath his t-shirt sleeve. Cas stared up at him, communicating peace and safety with his big blue eyes. _Huh. Weird... But I do feel better._

"Thanks, Cas." Dean kept his voice low, but Sam heard him anyway_, _if the stupidly pleased look on his face was any indication.

"Yeah," Sam broke in with a chuckle. "Thanks, Cas. He's a real girl when it comes to planes." Dean shot him a glare.

"Bitch, I _will _shoot your ass." He grumbled back. Cas caught his attention again when he wiggled his way closer to the window. Dean steadied him with a hand around his middle, feeling that Cas' curiosity had been spiked. He reached out tiny arms swathed in flannel, pressing his palms to the glass of the window. Dean could feel Cas' amazement and pleasure at the sight of clouds floating by out the window, and the feelings made a reluctant smile twitch onto his lips.

"What is it?" Sam asked, but Dean just ignored him for the moment. Cas' eyes looked huge on his face, as if he was trying to look at everything in the sky at once.

"Was it like this?" Dean asked him quietly, instinctively knowing that the moment called for it. Cas was distracted by the view, but the negative to Dean's question was still clear. "It wasn't?" Cas glanced back up at Dean for a short moment, tilting his head in that familiar puppy-dog way as he thought about it. Dean was suddenly overwhelmed with a feeling of lightness; he knew that Cas was trying to ineffectually communicate to him how it had felt to fly. The sensation made Dean's breath catch... It was unlike anything he'd ever felt before. The feeling didn't last very long; Cas' melancholy bled through, tugging at something inside of him. "You miss it, huh?" His voice was sympathetic. "Don't worry, man. We're gonna get you back to Bobby's, and we'll figure out how to get you back to normal." Dean rubbed a hand reassuringly over his small back, hoping that it wasn't a lie.

* * *

Not having anything else to occupy his time, Sam resorted to Dean-and-Castiel-watching to chase away his boredom during the flight. Seeing the angel that used to scare the pants off of him reduced to something so defenseless really struck a cord with him. Not to mention that Castiel was just so cuddle-worthy in that tiny form... Not that Sam _would_ try to cuddle him. He was pretty sure that Cas would send his ass back to the pit for just trying.

Sam wasn't as weirded-out by the communication between Dean and Cas as it probably seemed; the two of them had _always _had some freaky-ass way of understanding each other's silences. This was something on a whole new level, though. He could see that very clearly, the more he watched them during the flight. All it took was a touch from Cas for Dean to calm down when his flight phobia started kicking in, like the angel could somehow reach inside of him and take out all the bad. And Dean seemed to be able to 'sense' exactly what Cas was feeling, or what he wanted to say but couldn't. Sam _had _briefly wondered why Dean could sense Cas and _he_ couldn't, but had chalked it up to that 'profound bond' of theirs.

"Not much longer." He mused, mostly just to break the silence. Cas turned his head up to regard Dean, and a smirk twitched its way onto his brother's lips.

"Yeah," Dean said down to Cas. "I know." Sam frowned, having obviously been party to only half the 'conversation'.

"You 'know' what?" Sam asked, confused. Dean rolled his eyes at the bundle in his lap as he explained.

"Cas was bitching that he could have gotten there in a second on a normal day." He said. Sam nodded mutely, not really knowing what else to say to that.

The jostling of the plane as it landed saw a renewed panic attack from Dean, which Cas was quick to put an end to by touching the hidden handprint once again. Nevertheless, his brother seemed only too happy to get the hell out of the airport and head for Bobby's yard. The trip to Bobby's from the airport seemed to take almost no time at all, which was probably a good thing. Dean driving meant that Cas was redirected to Sam's lap, and that was just _awkward_. He didn't know how Dean seemed to think nothing of it. Sam was quick to hand carrying Cas back off to Dean, so that he could open Bobby's door instead. Poking his head in, he prayed that it was a good day and he wouldn't be met with a shotgun for startling the old man.

"…Bobby?" He called, only to hear footsteps quickly coming their way.

"Heya, Sam." Bobby called easily as he came to the door. "What's the problem this time?" Rather than try to answer, Sam merely stepped to one side so that Dean and his 'passenger' could be seen. Cas was propped up in the crook of Dean's arm, gripping his amulet tightly and regarding Bobby with a creepily serious look.

"We've got a problem." Dean said unnecessarily. Bobby stared at the two of them in nothing less than shock.

"I'll say…" The old man drawled sarcastically in agreement.


	2. Chapter 2

Dean grumbled to himself as he shoved his way in the door, Cas still propped up on his hip like the toddler he appeared to be. Sam rolled his eyes over his brother's bad mood, but knew that nothing he said would change it. The angel still gripped Dean's amulet, and Sam wondered if it comforted Cas to have contact with something so closely related to his Father. He shucked his jacket quickly, tossing it across the back of a chair and slumping into the worn cushions wearily. Their eagerness to get back to Souix Falls had made the flight feel like it lasted an eternity, but Sam had to admit that it had been the most _calm _flight he'd ever had with Dean. Castiel's reassuring effect on the older Winchester had been unexpected, but more than welcome.

"So..." Dean began, ready to get down to business, apparently. "What the fuck happened to him, and how do we fix it. The million-dollar questions." Bobby's eyebrows twitched up in agreement, sitting down behind his desk and pulling a bottle of scotch seemingly from nowhere. Sam momentarily worried that they were all turning into a bunch of alcoholics, but decided to shrug it off. When you dealt with the kind of crazy shit they did on a regular basis, he figured you had to be allowed a vice or two.

"Yeah, 'cause figurin' _that _out sounds like it'll be a walk in the park." Bobby shot back, but began pulling some dusty and obscure tomes towards himself anyway. That's one thing Sam had always appreciated about Bobby... He may complain like the best of them sometimes, but he was always willing to help them get the job done. "Well, let's start with the particulars then. Aside from size, how's it affected him? We dealin' with a full-blown baby or what?" Dean was already shaking his head.

"Nah, man. Cas is still Cas, just... mini. And unable to talk. And weaker." He added on, like an afterthought, shooting Cas an apologetic look. Bobby raised a brow at that.

"If he can't talk, how d'you know?" He asked, and Sam sighed for the explosion he knew was about to come. Dean scowled at Bobby, a tinge of pink crowding onto his cheeks and that uncomfortable look coming back full swing.

"I just _know_, alright!" He yelled. "How many times do I have to be asked the same damn question?" Sam rolled his eyes at Bobby while Dean wasn't looking, seeing Bobby mimic the gesture.

"Don't get your panties in a twist, Sweetheart." The older hunter drawled, making Dean scowl even more. Sam sighed inwardly. _It's gonna be a long night..._

* * *

Three hours later, information was still non-existent, and tempers were running short. Dean glanced at the corner of the desk where Cas had been sat, reading through one old book that was practically the same size as him. As Dean watched, the angel's big blue eyes began to droop closed, and he was fighting heartily to keep his head from nodding. Suppressing the teasing smile that so desperately wanted to break free – mostly just because he didn't feel like getting his ass smote the second Cas' mojo was back to normal – Dean reached across and gathered Cas into his arms. Settling the little body against his chest, Dean leaned back slightly in his chair and decided having his hands full was a good enough excuse to stop reading. _Research was always Sammy's strong point, anyways. _

"Dean..." Sam broke the silence, sounding concerned. "Hate to point out the obvious, but... angels don't sleep." Dean glanced down at Cas again, noticing that his eyes had slid closed and he was passed right-the-hell out. Dean shrugged the shoulder Cas _wasn't _resting against, keeping his voice low.

"Remember when he was Heaven's Most Wanted? Right before we went to gank Satan? He slept then. Maybe the weaker he gets, the more prone to human behaviour he is." He argued; it seemed logical to him. Sam seemed to be considering it, at least.

"It's probable. I mean, even if he's got a bit of his mojo in this form, he'll still be pretty weak, right? Could be that sleep is the first step to recharging already depleted batteries, as it were." Dean nodded in agreement, thinking that was probably the case as well.

"Well..." Bobby broke into the resulting silence. "We're gettin' nowhere quick here. I say we take a few hours to hit the hay, then get back to this in the mornin'." Sam seemed to _jump_ on that, quickly flopping his Sasquach-self onto Bobby's couch before Dean could even call it.

"Bitch." Dean accused.

"Shut up and go to sleep, Jerk." Sam mumbled, already passing out from exhaustion.

Dean knew how he felt; his bones had that deep-heavy feeling that just seemed so much worse since Cas sprung him from Hell. He reached slowly for his leather jacket, pulling it across him to cover his upper body and Cas, making sure that the angel's head was out in the air. Propping his feet up on the desk, Dean slid down in the chair until his head was resting against the back.

He resigned himself to another night of nightmare-infested sleep and closed his eyes, waiting for the horror to begin. When it didn't, and instead he only felt a curious _lightness_, Dean cracked an eye open and glanced down at Cas. The angel was still asleep, not seemingly doing anything on purpose, but having that calming effect all the same. Smirking to himself, Dean pulled out his cell phone and carefully snapped a quick picture of the little bundle of holiness. He was _so _gonna hold this over Cas' head when he got big again.

_Dean glanced lazily around him, recognizing the lake in front of him. He was sitting in a chair on the dock, fishing rod in hand, the same as last time. Which meant one thing: he was dreaming. Deciding to shrug it off and enjoy the serenity, at first he didn't even notice the figure standing just slightly behind him._

_"Hello, Dean." The voice didn't startle him at all; after all, it wouldn't be the first time Cas disturbed this particular dream. Turning his head to look beside him, he concentrated his thoughts until another chair appeared out of thin air._

_"Have a seat, Cas." He invited. He noted as the angel awkwardly perched himself on the empty chair that he was once again full-sized. Must be a dream thing. "Is this actually you, or am I just dreaming of you annoying me?"_

_"It is, in fact, me." Cas looked uncomfortable._

_"Great, I've got questions." Dean drawled wryly._

_"I will endeavour to answer them." Cas replied in his usual seriousness, the normalness of his voice making Dean's lips twitch with a smile_; _It was like nothing ever fazed the heavenly being._

_"What happened to you, man? What's with the whole Baby Gap routine?" Dean watched a ripple spread across the lake as Cas frowned._

_"I don't understand that reference." The answer just made Dean roll his eyes._

_"It's not important." He said irritably. "You know what I'm asking." Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Cas nod solemnly. _

_"You are inquiring as to how I was inflicted with my current condition." _

_"Yeah, if you wanna dress it up like that. What gives? How do we fix it?"_ _Just as Cas opened his mouth to reply, Dean felt a tugging on his consciousness. Fuck._

* * *

Sam had decided he was tired of waiting for Dean to wake his lazy ass up. After already downing two cups of coffee with Bobby while waiting, he figured it'd be faster and easier to just go get his big brother up himself. Spotting the way he was sleeping, however, altered Sam's game plan slightly. _Wake up in a minute. First… Revenge photo to get back at him for that spoon thing._

Dean and Castiel were both still passed out in the chair that Sam had left them in the night before, snuggled up together under Dean's leather jacket and looking just too adorable than a demon hunter and soldier of God really should. Pulling out his cell phone, Sam snapped a quick picture to use as blackmail whenever the time might present itself in the future. _Yeah… Try and play macho man after they see this, Dean._ Little bit of revenge completed, Sam shook Dean's shoulder that wasn't Castiel's pillow to wake him. What he wasn't expecting was the furious look on Dean's face when he did come back to the land of the conscious… You'd have thought that Sam had just been cheerfully murdering children rather than merely waking someone up.

"Dude, what the hell!" Dean snarled, making Sam raise an eyebrow.

"…'What the hell' yourself, man. It's almost ten; I got tired of waiting for you to get your ass up." He huffed in annoyance, but Dean only ran a hand over tired eyes. The jostling from sitting up straighter in the chair woke Castiel, who blinked sleepy blue eyes and shot Sam a glare that was eerily similar to his brother's. Dean looked down at the small figure, and chuckled lowly.

"I know, man. Sammy's the fuckin' _queen_ of bad timing." He said down to the irritated mini-angel. Sam frowned in confusion.

"What?" He asked, obviously missing some important detail completely. Dean tossed his jacket away before standing up with Castiel, arching his back and popping his spine after a long night in the chair. He extended his arms and held Castiel out to Sam, an expectant look on his face. Sam glanced at Castiel and then back at Dean, making no move to take responsibility for the small body.

"Come on, _Samantha_. I've gotta take a leak, and there's no way in hell I'm bringing him with me for that." Dean bitched. Sam threw him a look over the name, but awkwardly gathered the angel to him nonetheless. Holding Castiel under his arms, letting his feet dangle in the air, he moved to go back to the kitchen. Before he took even a step, Dean was stopping him. "Dude… Don't you know _anything_ about kids? You can't just cart him around like that. You gotta support him." Dean grabbed Sam's arms, rearranging them so that Castiel was tucked into his side, one arm beneath him so that he was kind of sitting, and a massive hand supporting his back to keep him from falling. Cas, for his part, took the rearranging with good grace and seemed to merely wait patiently for Sam to get the hang of it.

Rolling his eyes, Sam marched toward the kitchen and sat himself back at the table. Not knowing what else to do with Castiel, he just sat him in his lap and waited for Dean to come back. Bobby plunked a third cup of coffee down in front of him, and started frying some kind of breakfast on the old stove. Picking up the coffee, Sam halted his raising of the mug when Castiel awkwardly pulled himself to be standing up. Putting a hand around his middle to keep him upright, Sam was pretty far out of his element on what to do.

"What?" He asked the angel, hoping that maybe he'd be able to understand him like Dean. When Castiel stared at him, but nothing else happened, Sam had to admit to himself that he had no clue what the little guy wanted. Castiel raised a tiny hand and placed it against the coffee mug. As Sam watched, he leaned over slightly and looked down into the cup. His nose crinkled up into what Sam could only assume was distaste, and he was beginning to seriously worry that he was going to have to resort to playing some twisted game of 'Charades' just to understand what the damn angel wanted. "I'm sorry, Cas… I don't understand." He finally sighed. Just then, Dean came strolling back into the kitchen and rolled his eyes.

"Here." He demanded, taking Sam's mug of coffee out of his hand to bring it to the counter and tip about half of the contents into a smaller cup. He watched with some confusion as Dean added a couple spoonfuls of sugar and some milk to the new cup, bringing both mugs and a spoon back to the table when he was done. Handing Sam his now half-empty mug, he sat at a chair with the other and reached over to take Castiel and settle him into his own lap.

By this point, Bobby was watching in interest as well. Dean picked up the spoon and the small mug, holding a spoonful of the sweetened coffee in front of Castiel's mouth. Imagine Sam and Bobby's surprise when the angel cautiously sipped the coffee from the spoon, and then seemingly contemplated the taste. Blue eyes turned back up to Dean, and after a moment his brother was laughing. Honest-to-God _laughing_; it was a sound that Sam hadn't heard Dean make in a long time.

"Okay, chill out you caffeine-freak." He chuckled, smiling down at Castiel, before spooning some more of the coffee and feeding it to him. _This is so weird._

"How…" Sam began, but knew Dean would only get huffy if he asked him _again_ how he knew what the angel wanted. So, he tried a different track. "What…?" Dean spared him a glance, and snickered at the confused look that was probably gracing Sam's face.

"He didn't like the smell of the coffee… Thought it was too bitter. So, I figured he'd probably like it this way." Dean explained. Sam decided he was just going to have to set aside the complete fucked-upness that was his brother spoon feeding Castiel, Angel of the Lord.

"So…" He said instead. "First Cas sleeps, now it's food? This probably isn't a _good_ development, then. Wouldn't it be a sign of him getting… well… weaker?" Dean frowned at that.

"You might be right. He's worried, too… And a complete sugar whore." He added as an afterthought, which only made the angel glare up at the older Winchester. The effect of the glare was kind of ruined by the fact that he was still sucking on the spoon, in Sam's opinion. Bobby plunked down three plates of fried potatoes, eggs and bacon, joining them around the table.

"I gotta say, kid… I'm a bit at a loss on just where to go from here." He said, tugging on the brim of his trucker's cap. "The longer we take on tryin' to figure this out, the weaker he could be gettin'." Dean smirked at that, which threw Sam a bit. _Shouldn't Dean be worrying about this just as much as the rest of us?_

"Well then, Bobby…" Dean said in that arrogant tone that normally set Sam's teeth on edge. "It's a good thing I have a plan." Sam frowned.

"What plan?" He questioned. Apparently he wasn't the only one surprised over Dean's announcement; he didn't have to be able to 'read' the angel's feelings to see that he was confused as well. Dean was trading off between shovelling food in his mouth and spooning the sweet coffee for Castiel with his free hand, so it took him a minute to swallow and be able to talk.

"First, we gotta find ourselves some more of that Dream Root."

* * *

They all stared at him like he was a lunatic. He didn't know why… It seemed like a sound enough idea to him. Cas touched a hand to his arm to get his attention, a knowing look on his face.

"Nice to know _one_ of you doesn't think I'm crazy." He bitched. Sam rolled his eyes at that.

"I just don't understand what Dream Root is gonna do." The great man-child whined. Dean had to stop himself from rolling _his_ eyes in exactly the same way as his baby brother had just done.

"Because, _Samantha_… I found out last night that Cas can still dream-stalk like always, and I guess because it's a dream he's like his normal self and can talk and everything. He was just about to tell me what the hell happened to him when _someone_ woke me the hell up and cut him off." Dean watched with some satisfaction as Sam realized why he'd been so pissed at getting woken up.

"…Oh." Sam said, swallowing nervously when Cas turned to level him with that smitey look again.

"So, anyway… I figure if we go for like a Dream Root induced coma, maybe Cas and I can talk and we can get a step closer to fixing this." Personally, Dean thought his plan was a stroke of friggin' _genius_. He deflated a little when Bobby spoke up, though.

"Pretty sure that the Dream Root wouldn't have an effect on him, though…" Bobby mused, looking at Cas thoughtfully. Dean had to concede that the old hunter had a point… Not much affected Cas, whether it be booze or medication, even in a weakened state. Hell, it had taken an _entire_ liquor store's worth of hooch to get the angel plastered before.

"Okay…" Dean changed his tactic slightly. "Then we put him down for a nap or something, and I take the Dream Root instead. You know, go into _his_ dream, instead of him into _mine_."

"Why use the Dream Root at all?" Sam asked. "We've already seen that he can hop into your dreams still, so why not just fall asleep normally?" Bobby was shaking his head before Dean even got the chance.

"It's too unpredictable, idjit." He grumbled, getting up to clear their now-empty plates from the table. "One little sound or something and Dean wakes up. Then we'd just have to try all over again. The Dream Root would hopefully give the two of them enough time to actually get us an idea of what we're dealin' with." Dean smirked at Sam at that; it wasn't often that he got to feel like the smarter one over Standford-law-school-boy.

"…Alright." Sam finally conceded. "Let's see where we can get our hands on some."

And that was _exactly_ how they found themselves dealing with the most unlikely of people.


	3. Chapter 3

"…Balthazar. You want to try summoning frigging _Balthazar _to bring us Dream Root?" Dean was staring at Sam like he was an idiot. Sam tramped down on the urge to bitchface him, gritting his teeth in annoyance.

"Listen," He began, forcing himself not to start a fight with his big brother like they were prone to. "We already know how hard it is to get our hands on the stuff, _and_ Balthazar's helped us out a few times before. I figure if _anyone_ can get their hands on some – and quickly – it'd be that smarmy jerk." Sam looked to Bobby, hoping at least one of their little group could see the sense in his plan. Bobby seemed to be considering it, at least. Finally, the old hunter sighed in defeat.

"Balls." He mumbled, and Sam knew that he'd won that round. Grinning in triumph, he went to collect everything they would need.

* * *

"I _still_ say this is a bad idea, Sammy." Dean knew he was whining like a _bitch_, but just couldn't help it. Sure, Balthazar had come through for them a time or two in the past, but he'd also thrown their asses to the fuckin' _wolves_ a time or two as well. He just didn't trust the dick angel. Cas tugged on his necklace, drawing Dean's attention downwards to big blue eyes. Big stupid blue eyes that were puppy-dogging him into going through with it. _Damn it!_ He huffed out an exasperated breath. "Okay, okay, fine! We'll do it. Just stop with the eyes!" Sam turned to face Dean in confusion.

"I wasn't doing the…" He began, but stopped when he seemed to catch the look on Cas' face. Breaking into a huge girly grin, he looked back at Dean. "Dude… You're _so_ easy." Dean glared him down.

"Shut up, Bitch." He growled, but Sam just kept on grinning.

"Jerk."

The actual summoning of Balthazar didn't take that much time; they'd kind of gotten to be old pros at that particular ritual by that point. The older angel suddenly appeared from nowhere; drink in hand and decked out in his usual grey v-neck, tight jeans, and jacket. Sam would probably call the outfit something sissy like 'metrosexual', but Dean preferred the term 'just on _this_ side of gay'. Whatever.

"Always a pleasure." Balthazar sighed in annoyance, but Dean couldn't really bring himself to care.

"We need a favour." Sam began, using what Dean liked to call his 'bargaining' tone. Balthazar cut him off abruptly.

"Of course you do, darling. For what _other_ reason am I ever called to the two of you?" If Dean wasn't so worried about getting Cas back to normal, he might have appreciated the skilled sarcasm.

"Look," He started in a harsh tone. "we don't have time for the usual dancing around with insults, okay? It's friggin' _important_." Balthazar's eyes had turned to him when he spoke, and he saw them light on Cas' little form that was still propped securely on Dean's hip. The older angel looked mildly confused for a moment, before his brows raised in a bit of shock.

"…Castiel?" He asked, his tone disbelieving. Sam was nodding enthusiastically, obviously hoping that this would help persuade Balthazar to aid them. But Dean only watched him cautiously, prepared to get Cas out of harm's way if Balthazar decided to be a dick. When the full-grown angel took a step forward, Dean backed up and turned Cas away from him in reflex. He could feel Cas' wry amusement over the action at about the same time that Balthazar quirked an eyebrow at him. "Well. Do calm down, Mama Bear." He said in a dry tone that set blood rushing to Dean's cheeks. Even Sam snickered a little over that, the _bitch_.

It was Cas that finally convinced Dean to drop his guard a bit. Feeling a small hand grip his sleeve, he turned green eyes downward to clash with familiar blue. As the two of them indulged in one of their epic stare-offs, he could sense Cas' trust in Balthazar and his assurance that the older angel would help them. He could feel Cas' need to communicate with his brother, and reluctantly Dean gave in. He took a couple steps toward Balthazar, and motioned for him to hold his arms out.

"He wants to talk to you." He grumbled, and saw Sam's eyebrows go up.

"…_Can_ he 'talk' to Balthazar?" He asked incredulously as Dean traded Cas for Balthazar's drink to give him free hands. The older angel levelled Sam with a stare that would have done Cas proud.

"I _am_ his brother, Sasquatch." He remarked dryly. Sam pulled a face over the name, but kept his mouth shut. Obviously, he didn't want to tick off the only lead they had at the moment on helping Cas. The two angels seemed to stare at each other for what felt like a friggin' _hour_, before Balthazar spoke again. "…I see." He said simply, making Dean want to tear his hair out.

"_What_ d'you 'see'?" He barked, wanting some answers. Balthazar reached to hand Cas back over to Dean, snatching up his drink in the process. He took a long swallow before answering, probably just to spite the older Winchester.

"I do believe I've been chastised into helping you sorry lot." He finally said with some amusement. "I got the feeling that I'm supposed to be fetching something for you, yes?" Sam nodded once again, that borderline-pleading tone coming into his voice.

"We need to get our hands on some Dream Root," He explained. "so that Dean can go into his dream and speak properly with him. We figure maybe that way Castiel can tell us what happened to him, and we can sort out a way to fix it." Balthazar sighed, but seemed to reluctantly agree.

"Alright, alright. I've got just the ticket; it'll take me an hour or so." He said grudgingly. Looking back as Cas, he smirked in wry amusement once again. "The things you get yourself into, Cassie-Cat." Then, with a shake of his head and the rustling sound of invisible feathers, Balthazar was gone.

"I fucking _hate_ angels." Dean muttered under his breath. Sensing Cas' indignation over the statement, he was quick to assure him. "Not you, man. You're different." Cas was slightly mollified, but still a bit irked at the insult to his siblings.

"So now we wait…" Sam sighed, unnecessarily.

"Now we wait." Dean murmured in tired agreement. _Fan-frickin'-tastic._

* * *

Holding Castiel on his lap wasn't any less awkward the third time around than it was the first. Sam looked down at the small figure perched on his leg, resisting the urge to bounce him up and down like one would do with a _real_ baby. He was pretty sure that'd only piss the angel off. Balthazar's hour was long since past, and Sam wasn't sure if they should be getting worried or not. Dean didn't have any such qualms.

"I knew we couldn't trust _him_ to help us!" He burst out suddenly in the silent room, startling them all. Well, all except Cas. The mini-angel seemed freakishly to have almost been _expecting_ Dean's little outburst. The older Winchester swung around to face Castiel suddenly, a look of disbelief on his face. "What d'you mean 'have faith'?" He asked the small figure harshly, which made Sam even more uncomfortable… Dean directing all that heat at Castiel meant that he was also directing it at _Sam_, since Cas was in _his_ lap.

"Maybe he's right, Dean." Sam began, thinking that maybe he'd convince his brother to just _calm the hell down_. "We don't know for sure what's taking him so long. It doesn't necessarily mean that he's bailed on us." Dean just glared at him and turned his attention back to Castiel.

"I _am_ calm!" He snapped in Cas' direction, before he seemed to realize that his tone of voice and words completely contradicted each other. Dean sighed out a harsh breath, and Sam could see that he was trying to get a hold of himself. "It's just… You know. The sooner we get you all angeled-up again, the better it is for everyone. Big Evil comes around – like it _always_ does – and we gotta be looking after you, it's kind of a liability… No offense." He finished awkwardly, like he was worried he was stomping on Castiel's feelings or something.

Sam figured the angel had transmitted _some_ kind of reassurance to his brother, because Dean's tense shoulders relaxed after a moment. Castiel's confidence in his angelic brother proved to be right when Balthazar appeared on invisible wing beats a second later. What they hadn't been expecting was quite the _shape_ that Balthazar appeared in. A line of blood trailed from the older angel's forehead, and a dark bruise marred one obviously shattered cheekbone. His grey v-neck sported some interesting new slashes, and the knees of his pants were mussed with dirt. Sam raised a brow in question.

"What the hell happened to you?" He asked curiously, standing and lifting Cas with him. Balthazar waved a hand in the air as if to brush away the importance of the question.

"Oh, you know… Witches." He responded breezily, his and Dean's faces holding mirror expressions of distaste. _Huh… Balthazar and Dean agreeing on something. That's gotta be a new World Record._ With a click of his fingers, the older angel set his clothing to rights and healed his battered face. "Important part is…" He drawled easily. "I got what you were looking for." He held up a small glass jar containing a familiar root in triumph.

"I gotta say, I'm surprised." Dean said, arms crossed over his chest and a laser-like green gaze fixed on Balthazar suspiciously. "I woulda figured you'd be trying to extort _something_ out of us for this." At the look of fake-innocence that came onto Balthazar's face, Sam resisted the urge to roll his eyes while Dean called him on it. "And don't give me any of that 'who _me_?' crap… Your help has almost _never_ come for free and you know it." Dean turned his head slightly, and flicked a glance over Castiel where he was still clutched in Sam's long arms. "Only the telling the truth, Cas. Don't get so huffy." Balthazar rolled his eyes and tossed the jar for Dean to catch.

"Alright, alright. I _would _usually be suggesting a small… 'finder fee'… shall we say, however…" The older angel's face fell into a rare expression of seriousness. "I don't know what has the power to do this, especially to a fully-powered angel, and that disturbs me greatly. I'd rather you Winchester boys get on the case, as it were, and get this figured out. I don't really fancy finding myself in diapers any time soon."

"Dude…" Dean spoke up indignantly on Castiel's behalf. "He's not wearing diapers." Balthazar only rolled his eyes.

"Figure of speech then. Point is, we're weak and at risk in such a form… And I don't _therefore _want to find myself on the receiving end of it any time in the foreseeable future. So figure it out, children. Tah." With that last sarcastic comment, Balthazar was gone. Shaking his head, Dean tossed the jar containing the Dream Root to Bobby and started swinging into his leather jacket.

"Where are you going?" Sam asked curiously, which only caused his big brother to look at him like he was an idiot. Sam _hated_ it when he did that.

"Dude… I'm going to get the other stuff we need for that Dream Root tea. So come on, what else do I need?" He said impatiently. Sam's brow furrowed in thought for a moment.

"Well… we need the Root, which we have. Then ground ginger, cinnamon, and honey. Oh, and something of Cas so that we make sure you go into _his_ dream specifically." He listed.

"Okay. Ground ginger, cinnamon, honey. Got it. Be back in a few." Sam frowned again as Dean turned to leave.

"D'you _really_ have to go out for that? I mean, all of those are pretty common… Doesn't Bobby have them in the kitchen?" He asked curiously. Both Winchester boys turned to Bobby in question, who only threw a derisive glance at Sam.

"Do I look like I _bake_, Sam?" He said sarcastically. _Oh… Right. Good point._

"Okay, okay." He conceded as Dean smirked at him on his way out the door. As he heard the low grumble of the Impala coming to life, a thought occurred to him. "…Couldn't we have gone and gotten all that while we were waiting for Balthazar? I mean, we _had_ time to kill." Bobby raised a brow at him.

"I never said you two idjits were the brightest of the bunch." He drawled, making Sam smile.

"Thanks, Bobby." He responded with fond sarcasm to their father-like figure. _Now just hurry the hell up, Dean. The sooner we get this done, the sooner life can go back to normal._

* * *

Once Dean had come back with the necessary ingredients, they were ready to roll. Well… except for one _small_ problem.

"I just don't know here, man… You'll have to ask him." Sam said to him, making Dean frown.

"A little _detail_?" He snarked back. "Ask him what?" Sam huffed out a sigh before finally explaining himself.

"Well… The Dream Root tea needs to include some DNA of the person whose dream you want to enter. Problem is, since Castiel is in a vessel, technically it isn't _his_ DNA. It would be Jimmy's." Gigantor explained, and Dean caught onto the problem.

"And since who-knows-what happened to Jimmy's consciousness after he was stabbed when he _wasn't_ playing angel-condom, that could lead to me never waking up again." He finished for his brother. Sam nodded his head in seriousness, obviously now beginning to worry that their plan would only backfire on Dean. Turning to Cas, who was sitting upright on top of Bobby's desk, he figured he'd ask the one guy who would probably have the answers. "Cas? Any suggestions?"

The angel seemed to contemplate the matter seriously. Dean could feel his absolute concentration, his worry over something happening to Dean, his irritation has he obviously formed and discarded ideas in his mind that he thought wouldn't work. Finally, Dean could feel happiness as he obviously thought of something that would do the trick. Blue eyes flicked back up to meet his own, and Dean suddenly knew what Cas wanted from him.

"Sam, put together the rest of the tea." He ordered, then turned to the older hunter. "Bobby, grab me one of those Angel Blades that we held onto after all the problems with Zachariah… Cas' got a plan." Sam and Bobby both looked a little shocked and confused, but snapped into action pretty quickly. Dean wasn't really a huge fan of the plan, but if it was the only way then he didn't really have a choice.

By the time Sam had the rest of the tea brewed, Dean and Cas were at the kitchen table with the Angel Blade that Bobby had dug up for them. Dean lifted the angel so that he was seated on the table top, his gut beginning to roil in uneasiness. As Sam set the mug of Dream Root tea in front of him, the feeling became ten times worse.

"I don't like this, Cas." He said quietly, staring into serious blue eyes. He could sense that Cas was trying to reassure him, but it wasn't taking much effect. "I know you're all grown on the inside… But you still _look_ like a friggin' kid, man. This doesn't feel right." Sam and Bobby were both leaned against the counter, watching in confusion. At Cas' continued urging, Dean finally gave in.

Raising the Angel Blade in one hand, Dean gently grabbed Cas' little arm in the other. Making as shallow a cut as he could across the angel's forearm – _Wrong, wrong, this is SO wrong _– a bright light began to shine out of the cut. Following Cas' instructions, Dean turned his tiny arm so that the light streamed downward into the mug, illuminating the tea strangely. After a moment, he moved Cas' arm away, wrapping a strip of cloth that he'd already cut off of his shirt around the cut to contain the light.

"I get it," Sam said, having clued in to what was going on. "Cas doesn't technically _have_ DNA of his own, so we had to use some of his Grace."

"…Yeah." Dean answered, his voice a bit hoarse. He didn't like hurting kids… even if the 'kid' was really an adult angel on the inside. Dean's shoulders twitched, wanting nothing more than to shake off the slimy feeling he had from the act.

"So now we have to wait for Castiel to fall asleep?" Sam asked, but Dean only shook his head.

"Nah… He says he can meditate or some shit, and it should have the same result." Picking up Cas once again, Dean moved them to the couch in Bobby's study and sat the two of them down. Cas' eyes had already closed as Dean had carried him, and the older Winchester could only hope that he was doing his meditating thing already. Motioning for Sam to give him the mug, he shared a loaded glance with his baby brother before downing the drink in one go.

Laying himself back on the couch with Cas tucked into his side, Dean sent out a little prayer to whoever-the-fuck might be listening that this would work.

* * *

**A/N: As I said the first time I posted this story, no flames over the 'gay' comment please - I in no way mean it in a derogatory manner, as I myself am part of the LGBTQ community. **


	4. Chapter 4

When Dean next opened his eyes, the sight that greeted him was _not_ one that he was expecting. He didn't quite know exactly _what _he had expected, but his surroundings startled him nonetheless.

Underneath his feet was the soft squishyness of a forest floor covered in grass, leaves and moss. The temperature of the air around him was a perfect balance between warm and not-_too_-warm, and Dean found himself shucking off his flannel over-shirt and leaving it carelessly on the ground behind him. _It's only a dream, after all._

He took tentative steps forward, and the longer he walked the stranger his surroundings became. Trees rose up to complete the forest-y look, but they were interspaced with massive rustic wooden bookshelves that _should_ have looked completely out of place, but somehow just had that feeling of _belonging_. The bookshelves were jam-packed with tomes of various shapes, colours and sizes; they were crammed every which-way from the bottom shelf all the way up as high as Dean could see. The bookshelves seemed to just melt up into the canopy of the forest, retreating somewhere beyond the crown of leaves.

"Hello, Dean." The husky rumble of a voice snagged Dean's attention away from the books, and he quickly swivelled around in search of its owner. He frowned when he failed to see Cas anywhere.

"Dude… I _refuse_ to play hide-and-go-seek with you." He called out instead.

"I don't understand…"

"… 'that reference'. I know." He finished for Cas, hearing the frown in the angel's voice. Having listened carefully the second time that Cas had spoken in order to locate him, Dean turned his eyes upwards. There, perched on a thick branch belonging to one of the massive trees, was the once-again fully-grown angel. Dean raised a brow when he noticed that instead of his customary trench-and-suit-coat combo, Cas was wearing only the white dress shirt and wayward tie, sleeves rolled to his elbows and tails of the shirt un-tucked. "Well don't you look… comfy." Dean figured if Cas knew _how_ to roll his eyes, he probably would have.

When the angel said nothing, Dean decided to take matters into his own hands. He gripped the lowest branch of the tree Cas was perched in, and began a precarious climb upwards. When he reached Cas' branch, he slung a leg over to straddle it and get a good grip. Dean wasn't _really_ afraid of heights or anything, but one couldn't be too careful. Cas, for his part, had watched Dean's climb in his usual unflappable stoicism. Glancing at the sight around them again, he let out a low chuckle.

"I gotta say," He began. "this is one _interesting _dream you got goin' here." Cas did his frown-y thing again.

"This is not a dream, as I am not asleep." He explained in that cut-and-dried tone. "Since I am currently in a meditative state, what you are experiencing is a visual representation of my mind." Dean blinked at him.

"This is what the inside of your _head_ looks like?" He asked incredulously.

"I… suppose. To the best that you can comprehend it, yes."

"So… What's with all the books, then?" Dean asked out of idle curiosity. Cas' answer shouldn't have shocked him, but somehow still did.

"They are representations of my knowledge." He replied simply. Dean took another look around at what must have been _billions_ and billions of books, as far as the eye could see.

"Always knew I called you 'nerd angel' for a reason…" He muttered. "Man, Sammy would have a friggin' _field day_ in here." Cas shifted uncomfortably at his words.

"I do not believe I would be receptive to your brother's intrusion into my mind, Dean." He said in a tense voice.

"Right… Sorry."

* * *

Castiel nodded to acknowledge Dean's apology, observing his charge as he did so. Dean continued to gaze about him, his eyes dancing from place-to-place in an effort to commit all aspects of his surroundings to memory. Castiel noted idly that the older Winchester's perch on the branch was not quite as graceful as his own, and Dean was constantly having to correct himself from leaning to one side or the other.

"Perhaps we should – " But before his suggestion that they change locale was even finished being spoken, Dean lost his balance and began to slide to one side off the branch. Reacting quickly, Castiel dove after his falling charge and gripped him tightly on the arm where his handprint already resided. Flapping his wings slowly, he lowered Dean at a more sedate pace back to the forest's floor. Upon both their feet reaching the ground, he realized that Dean was gazing at him with shock and awe.

"Dude… I just saw your wings!" He burst out, incredulously. "Like… Not even just those shadows of them that you showed me in the barn, but actual full-on _feathers_!" Castiel blinked and glanced over his shoulder to where the inky black wings were drawn close to his back in rest. "Shouldn't I have burned out sockets instead of eyes?" The human finished in a confused tone.

"Just as this place is a representation of my mind, these wings that you see are merely a _representation_ of my true wings… Something that your mind is able to comprehend, and therefore _not_ my true form." He explained. "I will get rid of them, if they make you uncomfortable." He said solicitously, but Dean regarded him as though he had lost his mind.

"Get _rid_ of them? Dude, they're _awesome_!" His charge grinned and took a step closer. "Hey… Can I get a better look?" Castiel frowned, not understanding the human's fascination with wings that were not _truly_ his wings.

"You do realize they're not real." He answered instead. Dean rolled his eyes at him, an action that Castiel had seen Sam perform toward his elder brother on many an occasion.

"Yeah, I get that, Cas. But it's the closest I would ever get to seeing angel wings since I can't actually _see_ real ones without becoming Stevie Wonder, right?" Castiel wasn't sure what exactly a wonderful man named Steven had to do with the conversation, but he believed he knew what Dean was trying to say.

Instead of responding, He stretched the left wing out until it was half-extended, enjoying the feeling of the sunshine that was filtering through the tree canopy upon the dark feathers. Dean took another step closer, and Castiel wondered if he should point out to the human that he was breaking his own rules of 'personal space'.

* * *

Dean reached out a hand quickly, brushing the tips of fingers across the soft downy feathers. For some reason he had expected them to feel cool, but instead they radiated heat. Cas gasped a little, and twitched the wing out of reach while shooting a glare at Dean.

"Don't _do_ that." The angel growled grouchily. "They're sensitive." Dean grinned at him, but let it slide. He turned at almost the same time that Cas did, and they began walking lazily in an undetermined direction. Shoving his hands in his jeans' pockets for lack of something better to do with them, Dean figured he might as well get down to business.

"So… Care to tell me just what the hell happened now?" He drawled lazily, watching the way the low sunshine teased a multitude of shades and colours out of the dark feathers on Cas' wings. _Freakin' awesome._

Beside him, Cas frowned again and Dean idly wondered if his vessel's face would one day stick that way. He watched in some amusement as the angel mimicked his own posture, shoving his thin hands into the pockets of his dress pants. Feeling a softness against his feet, Dean glanced down and noticed that somehow him and Cas were both suddenly barefoot. _Feels kinda nice, actually._

"I was investigating into a series of strange deaths," The angel began in his usual solemn voice. "the method by which all the victims had been slain disturbed me. It felt… familiar." Dean frowned at that.

"Familiar how? Something we saw before when your asshole brothers were going all _Apocalypse, Now _on the human race?" He asked in worry. Cas shook his head slowly, as if he was reviewing and examining every detail in his mind.

"No… I don't believe so. It is difficult to explain." He finally answered, his voice the closest to a sigh that Dean had ever heard it, and his wings twitching slightly in uneasiness.

"Keep goin'." He urged, for lack of a better thing to say.

"I was examining the latest victim when I was attacked." Cas continued, and Dean felt the sharp edge of panic that he always did when someone he cared about was threatened. And he _did_ care about the feather-duster, damn it all. Cas had become like _family_ to them; he was basically an honourary Winchester, after all the time he'd spent helping them save the planet.

"How were you attacked? Are you hurt somewhere that we can't see with the form you're in right now?" He asked, clearing his throat gruffly in an attempt to hide the worry in his tone. Cas sent him a glance that on the surface would seem emotionless, but Dean figured he knew the angel well enough that he knew the truth. Cas was amused at him. _Stupid angelic dick._

"Aside from my current… condition… I am fine, Dean." He assured him. _I wasn't worried anyways. Really… I wasn't. I swear._ "The attack was some kind of spell, which bound my Grace to leave me incapacitated long enough for my attacker to force some kind of bitter liquid down my throat. I believe it was that substance that is responsible for changing my form."

"What did your attacker look like? Did you recognize anything about them?" Dean asked urgently. _Now we're getting somewhere._ Cas snuck him a hesitant look from the corner of his eyes. _Uh oh… That can't be good._

"I'm afraid not." He said wearily, the tiredness in his usually emotionless voice was not lost on the hunter. "They struck from behind, while my attention had been focused on the corpse. All that I saw was their hand… I _can_ tell you that it was smooth and not lined with age, indicating a younger body. In addition, they wore a large gold ring with a symbol upon it."

Cas came to a halt beside a gently swishing brook that ran between two bookcases. Picking up a random stick, he used it to draw in the silt at the edge of the water. As Dean watched, lines and circles came together to form a sigil that he'd never seen before. Committing the shape to memory, he knew that would most likely be the place to start in their search for Cas' attacker.

"I don't recognize it." He said as Cas finished the drawing. Lazily tossing the stick to one side, the angel brushed his hands off on the sides of his pants. It was an oddly human gesture, and made a smile pull at the corner of Dean's lips despite the serious topic of conversation.

"Neither do I…" Cas agreed, but Dean could tell that something was bothering him.

"What is it?" He asked.

* * *

Castiel regarded his charge in serious contemplation. Deciding to voice his concerns after all, he turned to face the human more fully.

"I don't recognize the sigil, but just as the method of killing was vaguely familiar, so too is it." He watched a frown pull between Dean's brows, and knew that he was not alone in his confusion. "I wish I had more information to give you." Dean shook his head as if to brush the last statement away, but Castiel could see the distraction of serious mental reflection in his eyes.

"I mean…" Dean began after some silence. "You mentioned a spell binding your Grace, then some kind of liquid being forced down your throat, and now hinky symbols? This is beginning to sound like friggin' _witches_ to me, man." He said in distaste. Castiel shook his head.

"No. There is no witch powerful enough to so thoroughly incapacitate an angel. I may be of the lower Seraphim, but I am still too powerful a creature to be so interfered with by such a weak magic." When Dean continued to look doubtful, he tried to find a more colloquial way to explain it. "A witch doesn't have the… 'mojo'… as you say." The word tripped oddly over his tongue in unfamiliarity, and Dean's lips twitched into an amused smirk.

"Do me a favour, Cas…" He said, amusement riding the human's tone. "Don't try to use my words again. It's like a cat _barking_, man… That shit ain't natural." Castiel would have to agree with that statement.

"As you wish." He simply said.

He and Dean continued to walk in silence through the forest of books, neither seemingly in a particular rush to return to 'reality', as it were. Castiel was content to remain within the bounds of the Dream Root mirage, as he did not enjoy being trapped in such a small and relatively defenceless form. He was appreciative to Dean for the care and understanding that the elder Winchester had shown him, but was uncomfortable with how reliant his _condition_ forced him to be upon his charge. It was Castiel's duty to protect _Dean_, not the other way around.

He wasn't sure why Dean seemed to be equally content to remain where they were; he supposed that perhaps it was the peaceful atmosphere of the forest. Castiel had noticed that 'peaceful' was not a term usually applied to the Winchester way of life. A part of him wished to be able to provide his charge with the peace he lacked… But Castiel had come to know Dean quite well, and as such knew that the man would never really be happy in a quiet life. Dean was the type of man that required action; he was a restless spirit that resisted permanent ties.

They had somehow circled back around to the large tree in their wanderings; seeing Dean glance up at the branch that they had sat upon, Castiel decided to temporarily relax his usually stiff disposition. Flapping his dark wings in preparedness for flight and the movement immediately catching Dean's attention, Castiel graced his charge with a rare small smile before gripping his arm tightly. With a powerful push of the air, their feet left the ground behind in favour for the skies. Castiel could hear a small huff of a laugh escape the hunter, just before he placed him upon their branch. Settling himself beside Dean with his back against the trunk of the tree, Castiel found he could not stop himself from asking.

"Why are you helping me, Dean?" His tone was merely curious, but the human looked at him as if he were mentally ill for asking the question.

"Why _wouldn't _I, Cas?" He asked in incredulousness. "You're my friend, man… You're practically _family_. You've sacrificed tons of shit for us before… I wouldn't let you just hang, not after everything we've done." Castiel responded with a pleased hum, before closing his eyes and settling back further against the tree.

"Thank you." He said gratefully, not bothering to open his eyes. He found he could perfectly picture the hunter's smile, regardless.


	5. Chapter 5

Dean's eyes snapped open suddenly, scaring the living _shit_ out of Sam at the unexpectedness of it. Leaning forward, he tried to gauge how his brother's talk with Castiel had gone. As Dean sat up, re-arranging a suddenly conscious angel to be perched on one knee, he rubbed a hand over tired eyes and looked absolutely _exhausted_. Sam swallowed a bit in nervousness. _That can't be a good sign._

"So?" He asked, eager to know and unable to wait patiently for Dean to tell them. The elder Winchester took a moment to stare at Cas, blue eyes meeting green for a long moment. Just when Sam thought he was gonna frigging _snap_ under his curiosity, Dean opened his mouth to answer.

"He was attacked." He said in a gruff voice, and Sam felt like lead had just dropped into his stomach. As much as Castiel was a little more closely tied to _Dean_ than anyone, Sam still worried about their feathery friend as well.

"Is he alright?" He asked in concern. "You know… _aside_ from the obvious?" Dean nodded his head, looking like he was puzzling something over.

"He said that they hit him with some kind of spell that fucked with his Grace, then forced some kind of liquid down his throat. He figures whatever the hell the liquid was is what changed him into mini-mode." Sam pondered on the details of that, but where his thoughts were heading was quickly derailed by his brother. "It's not what you're thinking. I already told Cas that it sounded like witches, but he says they don't have the…" Dean's lips suddenly pulled into a smile, which puzzled Sam.

"Don't have the what?" He asked in confusion. Dean coughed out a laugh, and Castiel was looking up at him in what seemed to be fond exasperation.

"Sorry. He says they don't have the _mojo_ to get the job done. Says it _can't_ be witches." Sam frowned at the news.

"So essentially we have almost _nothing_ to go on." He said, resignation pulling at his voice. Dean shook his head though, and a bit of hope sprung to life.

"Nah, there was more." His brother insisted. He motioned with one hand over to Bobby's messy desk. "Gimme a pen and some paper." Sam got up to fetch the items, wondering what they were needed for. He didn't have long to wait; Dean began sketching out a series of circles and lines that formed some kind of sigil that Sam had never seen before. "Cas was attacked from behind, so never actually saw _who_ did the attacking. But when they reached around to make him swallow whatever-it-was, they were wearing a ring with that symbol."

"It's a start, at least." Sam agreed.

"What you were up to at the time is probably another clue." Dean said down to Castiel's little form, before tilting his head back up to Sam and Bobby. "He said he was investigating some strange deaths; it was when he was checking out the freshest victim that he got attacked." Sam frowned again, trying to see how the pieces all fit together.

"… 'Strange' how?" He asked. Dean looked back down to Cas, as if for confirmation of his next words, before he replied.

"He said that the way they were killed was 'familiar' – _not_ in an 'Apocalypse-y' type of way, I already asked him that – and that even though he didn't recognize the symbol on the ring, it _also_ felt 'familiar' to him somehow." The confusion on Dean's face must have mirrored his own; the whole situation was just downright _weird_, and for guys that had 'weird' as their everyday profession that was saying something.

* * *

Dean absently ran a hand through his short hair, pushing out a tired sigh. Even though he'd just _technically_ been asleep while talking to Cas, he felt like he'd been going for hours on nothing at all. The more he tried to figure it all out in his mind, the less sense it seemed to make. _Who would attack Cas, only to turn him into a baby? Why not just kill him? Or, at least, TRY to?_ It just wasn't adding up. Sam slumped back into his chair, looking as confused as Dean felt.

"So I guess we can rule out this being some prank of Gabriel's from beyond the grave." His baby brother mused, and Dean twitched his eyebrows up in agreement.

"Yeah, it's got a little more of that 'I hate you' kind of feel, huh?" He replied dryly.

"Well," Bobby's voice broke into the conversation for the first time, slightly startling Dean. He'd forgotten the older hunter was even there, he'd been so quiet. "The way I see is, we've got two things to be lookin' into now." He pushed his ratty old trucker's cap up slightly to scratch at his forehead while he thought it out. "One is checkin' into that symbol there to try and get a handle on _who_ mighta done this… An' the other would be lookin' into how we reverse the whole 'baby' thing." Dean glanced at his brother, deciding to go for the seemingly less-difficult option.

"I call the sigil." He said quickly, before Sam could even open his mouth. The younger Winchester merely rolled his eyes, and turned to pick up some books from Bobby's desk. Dean turned to look down at Cas where he was sitting still as a statue on his knee; it was kinda weird… when Sam was that age, you couldn't get him to sit still for _anything_. Cas hardly moved unless he wanted something. _Guess that's what happens when you're a few millennia old on the inside, instead of a real baby._ "It's too bad that we couldn't somehow have all those books of yours on the _outside_." He mused down to the angel, which made Sam throw him a curious glance.

"What?" He asked, like Dean had been speaking another freakin' language, or something.

"Cas, man." He replied. "The inside of his head… It's like a _gajillion_ books in there." That didn't seem to be any more enlightening to Sam, but Dean sensed that Cas had just been struck with an idea. The angel's sudden happiness and pride made Dean swell up a little, like he'd just said something great… Even though he wasn't sure exactly _what_ his brilliant idea had been. He sensed that Cas wanted Dean to lay him down somewhere comfortable, and suddenly the hunter understood. "Good idea, Cas. You do your meditate-y thing and see if you can come up with something from all that knowledge you've got. We'll keep goin' with what _we've_ got, and hopefully one of us comes up with something." Picking up the little bundle of holiness, Dean made a little nest for him out of the couch pillows and his leather jacket so that he'd be comfy while he searched for information like the rest of them.

Needless to say, the research was slow-going. While Sam and Bobby seemed to _possibly_ be getting somewhere with the whole reversal-of-baby thing, Dean was coming up with _jack_ on the mysterious sigil. He'd checked every reference they had access to, looking up information on different demon sigils and stuff, and had even resorted to the internet a few times. _Nada. If it's not witches and not demons, what the hell else could it be?_ It was beginning to look like maybe it was something they hadn't had to tangle with before.

"I think we've got an answer to getting Cas back to full-size…" Sam said suddenly, breaking into Dean's thoughts. "You're not gonna like it, though."

"…What is it." Dean's voice was cautious; if Sammy didn't think he was gonna like it, that had to mean either something incredibly bad, or incredibly difficult.

"A _panacea_, of sorts." He answered, and Dean rolled his eyes.

"In English, Bitch." Sam huffed in exasperation.

"A kind of 'cure-all'." He explained, and Dean's brows pulled together.

"Okay… So what's the catch that I'm not gonna like?" He asked in confusion. Sam's face was deadly serious.

"We need the blood of whatever it was that attacked him." Dean stifled a defeated groan. _Yep. 'Incredibly difficult' it is._

"So in other words, we have no hope of fixing him until we figure out whatever did this in the first place." He said in a tired voice. Sam merely nodded his head in agreement. _Great._

* * *

Since Sam and Bobby's half of the research was apparently solved, they turned their attention to helping Dean search for answers to the sigil. Sam quickly saw what had his brother so frustrated; as far as they could tell, there was no record of the sigil or who it might belong to _anywhere_. Which could only mean one of two things: either the 'sigil' was really just a meaningless design on a piece of jewellery, or it was _much_ older than they had resources for. Neither option was particularly promising in helping them get a lead. It was just as Dean was throwing down another book in exasperation that Castiel's eyes blinked open. Dean swivelled to look at the angel, obviously having 'felt' that he was done meditating.

"Cas! Buddy…" He said, a note of eagerness in his voice. "_Please_ tell me that you have something." The angel and his brother had another one of those everlasting stare-downs that had always made Sam just a bit uncomfortable; obviously, Castiel was communicating silently what he either had or hadn't found in his own resources.

The staring was understandable in that instance; it was the only way that Cas _could_ communicate with them. But it had always put Sam a little on edge when the angel would do it before… It was as if he could see inside you right down to soul-level, and be able to read you like a book. Sam was just glad that it had always been aimed at _Dean_ more than him. How it didn't weird Dean out to quite the extent as it did to him, Sam would never know. At his brother's frustrated sigh, he felt the hope that Castiel had some answers sinking.

"…What?" He asked for clarification. "He's got nothing either?" Dean shook his head, but Sam got the feeling that it was at the situation rather than in answer to his question. "What is it, then?"

"I'm getting impressions of his feelings and shit… I just can't work out the specifics. It's too friggin' _hard_ this way." He ground out with a bit of a growl, making Sam raise a brow.

"Dude… I get that it's frustrating, but we'll figure it out. Just relax a bit." Figuring a little extra _push_ wouldn't hurt, he whipped out the puppy-eyes for good measure. Dean _always_ caved at the puppy-eyes. True to form, Dean rolled his eyes but relaxed the tense muscles in his shoulders.

"Yeah, yeah." He said in defeat. _Score one for the little brother._

"So let's start this way, then. What emotions or feelings are you sensing off of him?" Sam began, figuring they could try and logic their way through it. Dean sighed harshly, and turned his gaze back down to where the angel was still staring at him placidly.

"It feels like maybe he's found… _something_… but I can't really get a specific of _what_. Like, it's not the _whole_ answer that we're looking for, but that it'll help." Dean's voice was uncertain, as if he wasn't sure he was wording the feelings right. _Dean never was good at verbally expressing feelings to begin with._

"Okay," Bobby mused, breaking into the conversation. "at least that's a start."

"It just doesn't make sense, man…" Dean said in exasperation, rubbing his hands hard over his face. "Why do _this_ to him? Why not just straight-up attack him, like in a _normal_ way?" Sam thought on it for a moment.

"Maybe whoever it is wants to teach him some kind of lesson? Or maybe they want him to suffer before finishing it off?" He suggested. Dean's face hardened at that.

"_Nobody_ is gonna be ganking him!" He growled, and Sam went back into placating-mode.

"Of course not. We'll make sure to protect him until this gets sorted out, you know we will." Sam knew his brother well, and knew that if anything happened to Cas while he was like this, Dean would only blame himself. _I won't let that happen_.

Castiel reached out a tiny hand from where he was settled next to Dean, and touched the older Winchester on the knee. Sam watched as the tension eased slightly from his form, and thought again at how handy the angel's calming powers were. _I can't even remember how we used to stop a Dean spaz-attack before Cas came along… Probably something involving booze and loose women._ Sam would forever be grateful for the friendship they had found in the rogue angel, and the positive effect that it'd had on his brother. Somewhere in the dark recesses of Bobby's house a clock chimed, signalling the hour.

"Awfully dark for three in the afternoon…" Dean murmured with a frown while glancing out the window, causing Sam to chuckle.

"Dude… It's three in the _morning_." He said with some amusement. Dean blinked in surprise at that.

"…How _long_ was I out with Cas?" He asked incredulously. Sam raised a brow and thought on it.

"A few hours… We were starting to wonder if you were gonna be permanently comatose. What the hell took you guys so long in there, anyway?" Sam knew he had hit brother-teasing pay-dirt when Dean flushed a little and looked slightly uncomfortable.

"…We went for a walk." He mumbled, but Sam caught the words anyway.

"…A walk."

"Yeah."

"…A walk in Castiel's _head_." Sam reiterated, finding the whole conversation just too weird.

"Shut up, Bitch." Dean said sourly, scooping up Cas as he rose from the couch. "Goin' to bed." And without further ado, he stomped up the stairs to Bobby's only guest room.

* * *

Castiel blinked his otherworldly blue eyes, quickly taking in his surroundings. Around him was a familiar forest full of books, and a large tree. Glancing upwards, he caught sight of his charge perched on a high branch.

"Cas!" Dean called, momentarily losing his balance as he waved a hand to get Castiel's attention. Deciding to join his charge before he ended up taking _another_ fall from the tree, he flapped tangible black wings in preparedness of flight.

Glancing down, he realized that he was dressed similarly to when he had met with Dean earlier that day; he wore only his dress pants and shirt – with sleeves rolled, tails un-tucked and tie hanging loosely – and his feet were bare to the forest floor. It took only a matter of seconds for Castiel to join his charge on their branch, the hunter grinning at him widely.

"Why are we here?" He asked the human, confused. This looked like his mindscape from earlier, but it _wasn't_. Dean blinked slowly, obviously taking a moment to sort out what the angel meant.

"You mean we're not in your head again?" He asked, in some confusion as well. Castiel shook his head, glancing once again around them.

"No… We're in _yours_." He answered simply. "You're dreaming again." Dean frowned a little at that, before seeming to shrug the matter off.

"Huh. Must be because I was thinking about this place before I drifted off. Guess I kind of… recreated it?" He seemed unsure as to whether those were the right words.

"That is likely." Castiel replied. "Your recreation is strikingly exact." He mused, after examining his surroundings from the greater height of the tree branch. Dean shrugged the notion off, however.

"What can I say? I was nice inside your head, Cas." Castiel tilted his head in question, and Dean shrugged once again. "…Peaceful, I guess." He elaborated. The two of them sat on the tree branch companionably for some time before Dean broke the silence. "Well, we might as well make use of the fact that you're dream-stalking me again. What was it that you found earlier?" Castiel could feel his brows pull into a frown as his attention was drawn back to his earlier meditations and the subsequent… _disturbing_… discoveries.

"It is not much," He began, as a warning to the hunter to not get _too _excited. "but in my reflections I came to the realization that the symbol I saw upon the ring is not a sigil at all." Dean frowned over that, leaning forward slightly in his intrigue.

"What the hell is it, then?" He asked in confusion. Though breath was not strictly needed by the angel, Castiel found himself heaving a weary sigh regardless.

"It is from a dead language, many millennia out of use." He explained. "It represents a word of that language." Dean's face had taken on a guarded look.

"What word?" He asked cautiously, as if sensing that he would not be particularly pleased with the response.

"… 'Majesty', or 'Greatness'." The angel replied.


	6. Chapter 6

"… 'Majesty'." Dean reiterated, a sinking feeling in his gut. "Well, there goes any hope that it was gonna be something in our usual pay-grade." Cas turned slightly amused eyes to him, though his face was still serious.

"I believe we had already known that, Dean. Nothing simple could have done this in the first place." He answered dryly. _Okay, so feather-brain has a point._ Dean sighed in weariness, leaning more heavily back against the tree. He could feel the roughness of the bark digging into his back, and momentarily mused over how _real_ his dreams always felt when Cas got involved; it was as if the angel's presence suddenly made everything that much more… _sharp_, or lifelike.

He was tired. And not the _my-body-is-about-to-fall-over_ kind of tired ('cause he was very aware that he was _actually_ asleep and at rest just then), but the bone-deep _sick-of-fighting_ kind of tired that seemed like a constant companion to him in recent days. A part of him wished that he could leave it all behind… All the fighting, the struggle to survive, hell maybe even the knowledge of what actually went bump-in-the-night. Some days it seemed like it'd just be easier to set it all behind him and try out that apple-pie kind of life that Sammy had always thought was so great. But another part of him – the more realistic part, if he was being honest – knew that he'd never be happy like that. He _needed_ the hunt, the fight. The struggle was a big chunk of _who he was_.

"Dean…" Cas' rough voice broke into his thoughts, and he snapped his eyes back to see an uncomfortable look on the angel's face. "I am sorry that I have burdened you with aiding me." Dean frowned at that. Regret seemed to come off of Cas in waves, as if he'd known a bit about what Dean had been thinking.

"Cas… I told you last time, man. We're not just gonna ditch you to try and fend for yourself. That's what family's for, to help you out when you're down." He watched in some amusement as the inky black feathers of Cas' wings puffed out and twitched a little in happiness, sounding almost like rustling leaves, though his face stayed relatively stoic. _It'd be so much easier to read him if we could see his wings in real life._

"I feel… humbled, that you consider me to be family, Dean. Thank you." He said, honesty caught up in the simple words. The hunter shifted a bit, uncomfortable with the fact that it was coming _way_ too close to the always-dreaded chick-flick moment.

"Yeah. It's… It's cool, Cas. No sweat." He said, clearing his throat while the angel watched him with a small smile barely curling the corner of his lips. _Stupid feather-duster's laughing at me now._ "So… Any ideas on 'majestic' creatures that could have done this? Either that or the thing's just got a big ego-problem, right?" Cas' forehead crinkled up in thought.

"I… may." He said hesitantly. _Okay… That doesn't look like good news._

"Care to share with the rest of the class?" Dean asked when Cas remained silent.

* * *

Castiel regarded his charge in seriousness, unsure as to whether he should share his misgivings or not. He was grateful to the Winchesters and Bobby Singer for the aid they had given him in his time of need, but was reluctant to embroil them any further into the issue. _Especially if my fears turn out to be correct… I could be putting them all in danger._ His wings shook briefly at his back in his uneasiness, rustling in a way not unlike a human's shiver, and he saw that Dean noted the movement.

"Just tell me, Cas." He demanded firmly. Castiel felt his wings droop a little in defeat, and a triumphant grin graced Dean's face as he apparently knew what the action meant. Sighing heavily, Castiel resolved himself to – yet again – placing his faith in, and depending upon, the Righteous Man.

"It begins with the murders that I had been investigating. I had noted quite a number of deaths wherein the victims had apparently expired of… well… _fear_." That made Dean raise a brow in surprise, but he remained silent to let Castiel finish his tale. "That in of itself was strange enough, but upon examining the victims I began to feel that sense of _familiarity_; as if I had seen something similar before, long ago. However, the faintness of the impression made me question myself; I was unsure about it all." Castiel paused in his remembrances as Dean broke in.

"How long ago would it have to have been, for it to be so 'faint'? I mean, I thought you guys had like the perfect photographic memories goin' there." Castiel considered his charge's words carefully.

"For a memory to be hard to recall for an angelic being, it would have to be many thousands of years old… I'm not sure just how far back we can call to mind correctly."

"So we could be talkin' the most ancient of _ancient_ for whatever this thing is, then." Dean stated, though sounding unsurprised.

"There is the potential, yes. It is difficult for me, especially." Dean's brow knit in confusion.

"Why you 'especially'?" He asked. Castiel could feel his vessel's cheeks flush slightly in embarrassment.

"Compared to my brethren, I am relatively… young. I do not have the capabilities for recollection that they would."

"… So what you're saying is… you're a baby angel?" Dean asked, mirth tickling at his tone though he made a show of suppressing it. Castiel's wings snapped in irritation, almost knocking the human off of his perch on the branch, which only made the laughter bubble out of Dean's throat all the more. "Sorry! Sorry, man. I'm just… yeah. Relax, Dude." He continued to chuckle, though the apology did slightly mollify Castiel's annoyance.

"You are an exasperating creature, Dean Winchester." Castiel grumbled, and Dean reached out to smooth down ruffled feathers in an act of contrition, though he still wore a smile.

"I get the feeling there's more that you need to tell me, though." The hunter said after a moment, voice returning to seriousness and his hand falling away from Castiel's wing. "You have an idea what this 'ancient' creature is, don't you." Castiel's eyes lowered to the forest floor that resided far below them. He wasn't sure how Dean was going to react to his fears.

"It was the word, 'majesty', that first arose my suspicions." He began, hesitation threading its way back into his voice. Turning earnest eyes back to meet Dean's own, he strove to make the hunter understand. "I am by no means sure that what I fear is the truth." He insisted, and saw Dean begin to frown again.

"Just out with it, Cas… Tell me what you think, then we'll go about finding proof." His charge's voice was firm with absolute certainty that they would sort the whole mess out. Castiel drew in a deep breath, deciding that placing his faith in the elder Winchester was just.

* * *

Sam came awake in an instant, his hunter's instincts telling him that they were not alone in the house anymore. Keeping his eyes shut, he listened carefully to take stock of anything unusual. There was a small creak over by Bobby's old desk, and he could suddenly feel the air currents within the study shift just ever so slightly. The clenching in Sam's gut told him that this was _not_ a friendly midnight-visitor. Trying to be silent, he stealthily moved his arm under his pillow until he felt his fingers wrap around the cold steel of his gun.

"I wouldn't, if I were you." The voice made chills race up and down Sam's spine, and he opened his eyes quickly since the jig was up anyway. What he saw was an imposing figure; it was a man, tall with pale skin and dark hair. Sam leveraged himself so that he was sitting upright on the couch, and eyed the newcomer critically. He wore army-issue camouflage pants tucked into well-worn combat boots, and an olive green t-shirt that pulled tight over a muscular frame. Upon standing, Sam also discovered that whoever-he-was stood well over his own six-foot-four height. _Geez… Guy's gotta be almost seven feet tall_.

"I'm gonna take a guess that you're the one that attacked Cas." He said sarcastically, mind flying while trying to think of what to do. _There's no way I could take this guy in a one-on-one._ The stranger smirked, but it was grim and there was no amusement in his eyes; they were like pure, cold steel.

"I always did hear that you were the more intelligent one over your brother." Sam figured that he should've been used to everyone / thing in the world _apparently_ knowing all about his family, but he wasn't yet. It still creeped him out. Going on instinct, he raised his gun where it had still been clutched in his hand and landed a shot straight to the guy's heart. He watched with fatalistic acceptance as the round struck its mark and did nothing. "…You couldn't have _actually_ believed that was going to do something, could you?" The thing said derisively. Sam merely shrugged.

"Can't blame a guy for trying." He said easily, though he was already contemplating what other weapons they had in the house that might kill the thing.

"Don't bother. None of your petty pieces of tin and salt will harm me." It said with confidence. _Great. Just great._ Sam sighed heavily.

"So, what? You're here to kill us all, then?" He asked in exasperation. The thing frowned at his lack of concern with the situation.

"You should show a little more respect for something much more powerful than you." It said, and something flickered at the edges of Sam's memory. _What does that remind me of?_ There were suddenly some soft thumps coming down the stairs, and they both turned in time to see Bobby come around the corner wielding his favourite shotgun.

"Y'all okay, Sam?" The older hunter asked cautiously, keeping the gun pointed at the stranger in the room.

"So far…" Sam replied, eyeing the gun. "I already tried shooting him, Bobby. Doesn't work." Bobby's hands remained steady.

"Makes me feel better anyways." He drawled easily. The creature sighed, as if the hunters were wasting his time, and made a flicking motion with both of his hands. Bobby's shotgun clattered to the floor as he went flying across the room to be pinned up against a wall, while Sam was thrown and pinned to the opposite wall. Struggling against invisible restraints, Sam could only hope that Dean had heard the commotion and woken up.

"Who are you?" Sam gritted out, breath suddenly becoming hard to draw. The creature smiled, a wide grin that only made him look all the more terrifying.

"There's that fear that I was looking for…" It mused, taking a handful more steps in Sam's direction and pausing in the middle of the room. "You _should_ fear me, Samuel Winchester. You, your irritating brother, and most of all _Castiel_, have much to fear from me." Absolute loathing filled the thing's voice when he said Castiel's name, and Sam knew that this was more about _Cas_ than the rest of them… The creature seemed to _hate_ Cas, whereas Dean and Sam appeared to be just annoyances in its view. _What the hell is going on?_

"Let them go." Dean's voice sounded from the doorway, shoulder propped against it casually and Castiel watching unblinkingly from where he rested in Dean's arms. _A little bit of concern would be awesome here, Dean._ The thing merely turned to look at the older Winchester, raising a brow in question.

"And what will _you_ do about it, human?" The creature snarled nastily, but Dean just smiled like he knew something the rest of them didn't.

"I can do a lot of things… _Hadraniel_."

* * *

Dean watched with some satisfaction as disbelief passed over the stranger's face. _Thank God – maybe literally – for Cas and his memory._

"Didn't think I knew who or what you were, did ya Chuckles?" He said smugly, and could feel Cas warning him not to take the whole thing lightly. Pushing away from the wall, he walked a couple steps forward. "Oh, yeah. I've heard _all_ about you, Hadraniel. Your _brother_'s had a lot to say." Dean could see Sam's eyes widen a bit at that one.

"He's an _angel_?" He choked out from where he was still pinned, but Dean kept his eyes trained on the intruder.

"Now. One more time: let them go." The larger angel's eyes narrowed at him.

"I'm much more powerful than you are, human. Don't presume that you can threaten me." Dean smirked again, knowing that it would only infuriate him.

"You guys… You should really learn to check under carpets. I mean, seriously? How many times has this trick worked for us?" He said, and saw suspicion enter the other's gaze. The angel immediately dropped both Sam and Bobby, walking a couple paces toward Dean in a fury until he seemed to hit an invisible wall.

"Son of a bitch…" Bobby said in amazement, staring at the bound angel and making Dean's grin widen.

"Didja know that there was a kind of Devil's Trap that worked on angels, Sammy?" He asked, but continued on without waiting for an answer. "I didn't. Or, at least, not one that didn't involve _fire_. See, it's kind of awesome the stuff that we can find in Cas' head." Dean watched as Hadraniel pushed futilely at his invisible barrier, growing angrier with every attempt.

"Release me!" He demanded in a furious voice, glaring at Dean with murder in his eyes.

"…And my answer to that is 'Hell no', followed by 'Not until you give me what I want'." At his cocky words, Hadraniel whipped what appeared to be lightening at Dean, only for the deadly bolts to fall short of their mark. "See… One of the other things we found in all that knowledge Cas has locked up in there was a little thing called 'Protection of the Seraphs'. Which, conveniently enough, works to protect _against_ angel mojo as well. It's my lucky day." Turning his gaze down to the still form clutched to him, he smiled easily at him. "Cas, would you mind?" Turning his little head toward the rest of the room, Cas raised both arms and soon enough Sam and Bobby were illuminated with a bright blue light. They glowed for a minute before it disappeared, as if sinking into their skin. Hadraniel lifted his hands as if trying to toss them back against the walls, but nothing happened.

"That's impossible!" He burst out incredulously. "Castiel is much too young to know such things!" Dean full-out laughed at him.

"Just because Cas is young, doesn't mean he's not _lightyears_ ahead of you in intelligence. Don't underestimate little brothers that way, man… _Trust_ me." He said, throwing a wry glance at his own freakishly smart baby brother. "Always did say he was a nerd-angel." Dean could feel Cas urging him to hurry it up; the thing that the two of them knew and the others didn't was that Cas' protective spell had a time-limit.

"Dean…" Sam said suddenly, drawing his attention. "How?"

"Yeah…" Bobby agreed, sending Dean a mystified look. "Pretty sure I didn't have no Angel Trap under my carpet when I hit the hay a few hours ago."

"Painted it while Sam was sleeping. Cas dream-stalked me again, and had an idea of what it was that we were up against. So, I came down and did a little prep-work, just in-case Chuckles here decided to show up."

"Gee, thanks for the warning." Sam bitched, but Dean shrugged it off.

"We had no guarantee that he was gonna show up tonight. Figured I'd let you sleep on the off-chance that he didn't." Ignoring his brother's eye-rolling, Dean turned his attention back to the trapped angel. "So. You're stuck here until I say so, and you can't do _jack_ to hurt us. You're my bitch until you give me what I want." He said with a menacing grin, because Dean could be a scary motherfucker when he wanted to as well.

"And _what_ is it that you want?" Hadraniel asked him, hatred pouring out of every word.

Dean reached behind him with his free hand and drew an Angel Blade, the smile on his face the coldest that it had ever been.


	7. Chapter 7

"Oh, nothing much." Dean said in response to Hadraniel's question of what it was that he wanted. "Just a little bit of your Grace." He knew damn well what kind of reaction that was likely to get out of the older angel, but they couldn't make Cas' cure without it. True to form, Hadraniel scoffed at the suggestion.

"Never." Was the simple and condescending reply. Dean glanced at Sam out of the corner of his eye, keeping the majority of his attention focused on the resident prisoner.

"Sammy." He called to get his brother's attention. "Start putting together the rest of the shit you need for that pana-whatever for Cas."

"_Panacea_." He corrected with a bit of a bitchface, but got to work immediately after. Dean moseyed his way over to Bobby, wanting his easy manner to give off the air that _he _was in control of the situation and _not_ the trapped angel. Intimidation usually played a huge role in these things.

"Bobby, take Cas for a bit while I get some… _co-operation_… outta Bigfoot over here." He handed his friend over to Bobby easily, knowing that the older hunter would do anything to protect him while he was so defenseless. Bobby – good ol' Bobby – didn't put up a fuss over taking charge of the small form, but frowned at Dean for a moment.

"What d'ya want, Dean?" He asked, suspicion in his tone. The older Winchester knew the man well enough to know that Bobby had already figured out what was about to go down in the middle of his study. Avoiding his father-figure's eyes by glancing back at the leashed angel, his response was hard.

"Keep him in the kitchen with Sam. Stay there until I come in." He said. The _last_ thing he wanted any of them – Cas especially – to see was him going all torture-master on Hadraniel's ass.

He knew that Cas knew all about what he'd been up to in the Pit – hell, he'd probably even _seen_ Dean at it when rescuing him – but he never wanted his friend to have to witness again the darkness buried deep down in his soul… to have visible proof of the kind of _monster_ that he could be.

Cas, no matter how much of a rebel angel he'd become, had this innate sense of innocence to him. As much as Dean liked to tip his halo a little crooked sometimes, he promised himself that he wouldn't be the one to destroy that innocence completely. Bobby nodded his head, obviously deciding to play it Dean's way. Once his family was all safely out of the way in the kitchen, Dean focused completely on the only other being in the room.

"Let's play, shall we?"

* * *

Sam wasn't as naïve as he sometimes seemed. He knew _exactly_ what was going on in Bobby's study while he prepared the other ingredients necessary for the _panacea_, and it was a little hard to miss the growled threats and badly-suppressed screams of pain that were coming out of the larger angel in the other room. But, he _also_ knew that this was a touchy subject for Dean. His big brother had always had a bit of a chip on his shoulder while growing up, but when he returned from Hell it had been a whole different kind of ball game.

Dean had returned a broken man. Sam could see how Castiel's presence in their lives had helped to 'fix' his brother in a lot of ways… But he could also see that it was gonna take a lot longer for Dean to be convinced that he was worth the love and concern that they all felt for him. That was the part that had always stunted the friendship between the angel and his brother, Sam knew – the fact that Dean believed he wasn't worthy or love or saving, and the fact that Castiel couldn't understand _why_ he didn't believe it. Sam had hope that one day they'd be able to convince Dean… somehow. His thoughts were broken as the object of them came into the kitchen covered in blood not his own.

"Got the rest of that ready?" The older Winchester asked while holding out a hand, twitching his fingers impatiently. Sam hesitated only a second as he noticed that Dean was steadfastly refusing to look anywhere even _near _the small angel's form perched on the kitchen table.

Castiel, for his part, was staring intently at Dean with unblinking eyes. It made Sam wish that he could 'read' the angel as well as his brother, if only to know what Cas was thinking about all this. He handed over the small bowl of mixture that he had prepared, sighing harshly as the agonized sounds from the other room renewed with Dean's re-entrance. _I think I really don't want to know what's going on in there._ Flopping himself down at the kitchen table, Sam leaned his chin on one hand and regarded Castiel in thought.

"Hey, Cas…" He began, hesitation in his voice; he wasn't sure how well a one-sided talk with the angel would go for him. Castiel's focus turned away form the doorway where Dean had disappeared to settle on Sam, and he tried not to feel _too_ intimidated by it. "Um… Obviously I can't really know what you're thinking or feeling right now, but I just wanted to say that… Dean wouldn't be doing this, y'know, if he had any other choice." He finished, somewhat awkwardly. The angel just continued to stare at him with an unblinking gaze. "…Okay, y'know what. I'm just gonna stop talking."

Castiel reached out and laid a small hand on the back of Sam's where it had been resting on the table, and the younger Winchester decided to take it as a sign that Cas wasn't overly upset about Dean beating the shit out of his brother. The small moment came to a halt when a horrible scream sounded from the other room, making Sam jump to his feet. Dean appeared in the kitchen a moment later, panting for breath slightly and holding the small bowl Sam had given him. The contents, which had been a dull reddish-brown before, now seemed more translucent and looked a bit like glowing blood. Sharing a look with Sam that clearly said _I don't wanna talk about it_, Dean turned to where Castiel was still seated on the table.

"Hope you're thirsty, Cas." He muttered as he moved closer to angel, tipping the bowl slightly so that he could drink from the bowl's edge.

Sam was just praying that this worked… Because if it didn't, he and Dean were in a world of crap with a very _big_, very pissed off angel in the other room.

* * *

Castiel drank down the foul-tasting mixture the fastest that he could manage with such a small mouth. It seemed to burn as it went down his throat, igniting a fire in his stomach and blazing across nerve endings. To say that the experience was pleasant would have been a falsehood.

The changes began almost immediately. He felt extreme agony as under-developed muscle and tissue were stretched and elongated, bones popping with noisy cracks and crunches as they re-conformed to shape. There was a ripping sound as the small pair of denim trousers Dean had forced him into were suddenly too small, tearing at their seams and giving way to his expanding body. A groan of pain sounded from low in his throat as silenced vocal chords were suddenly free to function. Logically, Castiel knew that the whole process must have only taken a few minutes, but the experience had felt significantly longer to him in his agony.

"Well… Welcome back, Kotter." Dean drawled, though there was a shaky edge to his tone. Castiel's eyes opened at the sound of his charge's voice, breaths coming labourously to him after the strain his body had gone through. He frowned after a moment, tilting his head curiously.

"I don't understand…"

"…that reference. Yeah, I know." Dean finished for him, a smile coming onto his face. "Good to have you back, Cas. Well, first things first…" He said, clapping a hand to Castiel's shoulder that was still swathed in the flannel of Dean's too-large shirt.

"What's that?" Castiel asked curiously. The elder Winchester grinned, and it was then that Castiel noticed both Samuel and Bobby Singer were determinedly looking upwards at the ceiling for some odd reason.

"We get you a pair of pants." Dean answered wryly. Glancing down, Castiel noted that he was less-than-adequately covered at that moment, the small denims having been insufficient for such a larger body. Tugging the flannel over-shirt to make sure he was somewhat modestly covered, Castiel could feel the heat of embarrassment spring to his cheeks. Leaning forward with the intent of raising from his seat on the table, he stopped his movement as a chorus of "NO!" sounded from the other men.

"Dude…" Sam said, a hint of panic to his voice. "I'm pretty sure it's a sin or something to be seeing an angel's – y'know – so just… stay there. We'll bring clothes to you." Not knowing what to say to that statement, Castiel merely nodded his head in acquiescence.

"Bring down a pair of jeans and a t-shirt outta my duffel." Dean called to his brother, just before Samuel left the room. "Your stuff would be _huge_ on him." As Sam disappeared through the doorway, Dean turned back with a smirk twitching at his lips. "I draw the line at sharing underwear, though. You're on your own _there._" Bobby Singer was eyeing up the kitchen table with a look of distaste on his face.

"Remind me ta burn that table…" He muttered darkly, and Castiel frowned in confusion.

"Is there something wrong with the table?" He asked, glancing down at the solid wood that he remained seated upon. Dean's laughter drew his gaze back upwards, only confusing him more.

"Yeah… There's a whole lotta naked angel ass contaminating it." He choked out around his laughter. Sam returned to the kitchen at that moment, a grimace coming to the young hunter's face as his eyes flicked down to – and then consequently _away_ from – Castiel's bare legs.

"Here." He said, practically shoving the bundle of clothing into Castiel's hands. "We'll be in the study."

What a strange group he had somehow become embroiled in.

* * *

Dean forced himself to reign in his chuckles over the whole thing in the kitchen. The situation had been funny, sure… But he knew that part of his laughter had sprung from the absolute _relief_ that had welled up in him when he'd seen that Cas was back to his old self. Cas as a tiny little child would definitely be worth some teasing points – that was for _damn_ sure – but Dean never wanted to see his friend stuck so defenseless again.

When Cas re-entered the study, this time under the power of his own two fully-grown feet, Dean was taken aback a little. The angel was now properly covered from head to toe, wearing Dean's own jeans, black t-shirt, and the flannel over-shirt unbuttoned with the sleeves rolled to his elbows.

Dean hadn't ever really given a lot of thought to Cas and clothes… It had always seemed like his suit and trench coat were more like a second layer of skin rather than a fashion choice. Seeing him lacking the coats when they'd met in Cas' head and again in Dean's own dream had been… odd… but still somehow essentially 'Cas'. Seeing Cas in his own – much more _relaxed_ – clothes was just downright _weird_.

"Hadraniel." Cas greeted in his rough voice, coming to a halt beside Dean and shoving his thin hands comfortably into the pockets of the jeans, much like he had done in their forest library. Turning his attention back to the trapped angel, Dean's mood sobered instantly at the look of pure hatred that was written all over Hadraniel's face and directed straight at Cas. _Try to touch him… I fucking DARE you._

"Castiel." The older angel snarled in return. "You have an amazing amount of _luck_, for one so inexperienced." Cas stared at his brother, his face remaining expressionless, but Dean could have _sworn_ he saw a smirk lurking somewhere in those blue eyes.

"You should know as well as I do that luck doesn't usually play a factor in our existence. Our Father ensured that I was well taken care of." Was his easy reply. A grin threatened to twitch onto Dean's lips at the back-handed compliment Cas had just given him, but he suppressed the urge. _It's serious time._ "You left too many clues to your identity, brother. You had to have known I would put it together eventually."

"What 'clues'?" Sam asked curiously, and Dean had to admit that he'd been wondering as well. When Cas had told him in his dream that he thought his attacker might be his brother, they'd focused more on how to trap him rather than the particulars to _why_ Cas had come to that conclusion.

"Hadraniel's post is that of Gatekeeper to the Second Gate of Heaven. He is well known among the Host as a fierce warrior, and many fear him. His notoriety in this regard has only served to bring trouble, however." He began to explain, only to be cut off by Hadraniel himself.

"I did no such thing!" He protested fiercely, though Cas didn't even twitch at the shout. Instead, he raised a condescending eyebrow that served to rile the angry angel up even further and made pride well up in Dean's chest. _Cas' human qualities are coming along nicely._

"You terrified Moses so greatly when he came to retrieve the Torah that he _wept_ with fear." Cas answered dryly.

"I was only doing my job!" The enraged angel insisted.

"…God himself reprimanded you for your actions." Cas returned easily. Giving Bobby and the two Winchesters his attention, he explained. "The suspicious deaths that I had been investigating were all victims that had expired of _fear itself_. This brought to my mind a distant memory of Hadraniel's past actions, though at the time I could not properly recall them."

"Hence the 'familiarity'." Sam put in, earning a nod from Cas.

"They were sinners who deserved their fates." Hadraniel said darkly, drawing Cas' attention back to him.

"That is not for _you_ to decide. This you know." Cas pulled his hands out from their easy place in his pockets, and though it seemed like a small action, Dean knew that the angel was preparing himself for a coming battle. The knowledge made the muscles in Dean's shoulders tense, expectant with the urge to move and _fight_. "The other clue was the ring upon his finger." Cas continued, as if ignoring his older brother completely. _And to think I dared to call him 'junkless' before_, Dean thought to himself with a bit of a smirk.

"Cas told me in my dream that it wasn't a sigil at all, it was from some ancient language meaning the word 'majesty'." Dean explained to Sam and Bobby.

"Correct. Hadraniel's name means _Majesty of God_." Cas finished, and Dean had to mentally bow to the nerd-angel's smarts… He was pretty sure that if he'd been in Cas' position, he wouldn't have put all that together. Well… maybe he _would_ have. Just probably not as quickly as Cas did. Probably.

"Which leaves us with only one question left." Sam observed, and Dean could see Cas nodding out of the corner of his eye. The smaller man – er, angel – took a few steps forward until he was directly in front of his trapped brother.

"_Why_, Hadraniel?" He asked, brow crinkling in confusion and bewilderment buried deep within his gravel-like voice.

Dean felt a pang of hurt on the angel's behalf… Dean and Sam may have gotten used to the idea of almost all angels being royal a-holes, but to Cas they were still _family_. Standing in front of the poor guy wasn't just an enemy, but a brother that had betrayed him. In a silent show of support, Dean took a step forward and lightly gripped the back of Cas' neck with one hand. He knew that the angel was _way_ stronger than him – even on a bad day – and didn't really _need_ it, but he also knew that emotions and shit were a really new and confusing thing for Cas.

And just like John had always taught them… Winchesters take care of their own.


	8. Chapter 8

Needless to say, Sam was just as puzzled as the others. He got that Hadraniel wasn't exactly the first of Castiel's brothers to have betrayed him – and in all honesty, probably wouldn't be the _last_ – but with the others there had always been some kind of _reason_ for the betrayal… Usually of a 'we want to start the apocalypse' kind of nature.

But this time, there didn't seem to be a clear answer to the 'why' of it all; it _could_ be that Cas had simply gotten too close in his investigation of Hadraniel's murders, but that didn't seem to fit. Hadraniel clearly had a real _personal_ hate-on for Castiel, above and beyond being caught doing something wrong. _So what gives, then?_ Sam figured he wouldn't have very long to wonder, since it looked like the usual bad-guy-gives-the-great-reveal scenario was about to go down.

"Why?" Hadraniel spat out hatefully, so much rage in his voice that Sam wanted to take a couple steps away from the gigantic form. _If even I'm that intimidated by his size, I can't imagine how Cas is staring him down like that… He may be almost six feet tall on his own, but Cas is still kinda a small guy._ "You want to know _why_ I attacked you?" The bound angel seemed to be almost in shock that Castiel was even asking, as if Cas should have _known_ the answer to 'why'.

"Yes, brother." Castiel replied in that calm and deep tone that had always made Sam's hair stand a little on end with its unflappability. "What have I done that you've perceived as a wrong to you?" Sam couldn't have missed the strategic use of the word 'perceived' if his life depended on it. _Good for you, Cas._ Hadraniel's frown became even darker, and if he could have shot fire from his eyes he probably would have.

"You! _Everything _that you are! It enrages me!" The larger angel growled. "You throw aside the Host – your brothers and sisters – and rebel against your true calling, begin fraternizing with… with _this_…" He said in contempt, waving a hand in Dean's direction and looking at the elder Winchester like he was the scum of the earth. "You even go so far as to _murder_ your own kind! And what is the punishment that you receive from our Father for your faithlessness? Nothing!" Sam's eyebrows twitched up in surprise at his vehemence. "Not only are you _not_ punished for your betrayal, but you were restored to your true form _twice_!"

"Three times, if you include today." Dean threw in smugly, obviously wanting to rub it in Hadraniel's face. The look that his comment earned from the imprisoned angel promised a slow and painful death. _Dean… Can't you ever keep your mouth shut?_ Sam thought wearily, well used to his brother's snarky comments getting them in even _deeper_ shit. Within the bounds of the Angel Trap, Hadraniel took a threatening step in Dean's direction. Castiel shifted enough that his body was partially in front of Dean's, placing himself in between his charge and the enraged angel.

"You will not harm Dean Winchester." Cas said simply, but the amount of deadly threat that was buried in his calm tone was actually kind of scary.

"You are _far_ too young and too weak to be ordering me about, Castiel." Was the ominous reply. Sam was beginning to worry that an angelic throw-down was about to happen in the middle of Bobby's study when Dean's voice broke into the tension.

* * *

Dean glanced back and forth between the two angels, getting a bit tired of the pissing contest, to be honest. And also? He _so _didn't need Cas' protection from this guy. He wasn't a friggin' _girl_.

"Just throwin' this out there…" He began, cutting into the glaring contest that they seemed to be having. "But did it ever occur to you that God keeps bringing Cas back because that's what he _wants_?" Both angels turned to look at him; Hadraniel with that same contempt, and Cas with a hint of surprise and confusion buried in his blank face. Dean liked to think that he'd gotten good at reading the feather-duster's minute expressions, even without being able to see his wings.

"Do _not_ presume that you know God's will!" Hadraniel growled, but Dean only raised a brow at him.

"Aren't you doing the same thing?" He tossed back at him. "Aren't you _assuming_ that Cas rebelling and coming to help us was 'against the will of God'? Maybe he was _supposed_ to. I mean, aren't you the ones that keep telling us that 'God works in mysterious ways' and 'God is everywhere' and all of that shit? So who's to say that Cas wasn't _meant_ to rebel and come bat for our team, huh?"

Dean buried the discomfort that he was feeling with the whole discussion; he'd never really believed in God until coming to know Cas, and now here he was arguing with a freaking Angel of the Lord that _he_ knew better than it did about what God wanted. _This is so not gonna end well… But at least I tried._ Out of the corner of his eye, he could see one of Cas' brows twitch up in surprise, like he'd never considered that point of view.

"Preposterous." Hadraniel spat, though Dean could hear a subtle note of uncertainty in the big guy's tone. _Good._

"Enough of this debate." Cas ordered, turning back to his brother. "Give me your vow that if I let you out of the circle, you will return to your post in Heaven as you were meant to be. No more killings, no more attacks." The larger angel looked at Cas like he was an idiot for even _suggesting_ it.

"No." He said simply, and Dean heard a quiet little sigh of resignation leave his friend.

"Then you leave me no choice." Cas replied in finality. Raising a hand, he made a kind of waving motion, and suddenly the three hunters and two angels were standing in the middle of some kind of field. As Dean's stomach spun a little with trying to orient itself, he noted quickly that Sam and Bobby were glowing. Looking down at his arm, he could see the same light, the fading of it away indicating that Cas' spell was wearing off. _Well, fuck. There goes our angelic protection._

* * *

Castiel had hoped that his brother could be reasoned with, but had known deep inside of him that it was a fruitless effort. Hadraniel was far too angry to be reasoned with. He could feel the Protection of the Seraphs coming to the end of its shielding on the human hunters, and could only hope that Hadraniel would not realize it right away.

Sam and Bobby Singer had both been clutching firearms when Castiel had transported the group, but he saw now that Dean had been left weaponless. Not wanting his charge – his _friend_ – to come to harm, Castiel quickly tossed his only Angel Blade to the elder Winchester. Dean caught it neatly, and the smaller angel turned his full attention back to his enraged brother.

"Why?" Hadraniel questioned as he stalked toward Castiel with deadly intent. "Why does He love you so much more than us? Why does He _allow_ you to do these things? Why does He continue to _help_ you?"

"You know as well as I do that our Father's reasons are known only to Him." Castiel replied, bending at the knee slightly in preparedness for an attack.

"It is not _fair_!" The older angel growled. Castiel had to suppress a subtle curving of his lips that was threatening to break free.

"If there is one thing that I have learned in my time with the Winchesters, it is that _life_ _isn't fair_." He replied, and could see Dean's proud smirk from his peripheral vision.

When Hadraniel attacked, Castiel was ready. As the larger angel swung what would have been a mighty blow, Castiel's smaller frame was quick to duck underneath it and avoid the strike. His evading tactics served him well for the first few moments, until he underestimated one of Hadraniel's movements, resulting in a hit so powerful that it threw Castiel across the field and into a nearby tree. The trunk of the tree shattered under the force of the collision, and it took him a couple tries to be able to rise to his feet.

Across the field, Sam and Bobby Singer were shooting at Hadraniel; their purpose was obviously to distract the larger angel while Castiel regained his feet. Flapping invisible wings, he quickly crossed the distance in order to renew their battle. Just before he arrived, Dean swiped at their foe with the Angel Blade, cutting a long slash in Hadraniel's side. The wound was not deep enough for his brother's Grace to shine through, and in turn only served to enrage him further. A strange sinking feeling came to Castiel's stomach as he saw Dean get knocked back several feet, the Angel Blade flying from his grasp.

"Dean!" Castiel's voice was raspy over and above its usual gruffness, worry for his friend clogging his senses. _Concentrate, Castiel. The others will only be harmed further if you don't concentrate._ Giving himself a bit of a shake, he once again dove into the fray in order to stop his brother's violence.

Castiel _would_ stop Hadraniel from harming anyone else, or would perish himself in the effort.

* * *

Dean watched as Cas jumped right back into the fight, mentally cursing the stupid feather-brain for it, while also ignoring the fact that he would have done the _exact_ same thing. Cas was taking on an angel whose vessel was practically _twice_ the size of his own, not to mention who was on a higher pay-grade in the whole angelic hierarchy. Not that Cas hadn't taken on angels more powerful than himself before, but this time he was doing it _without a freakin' weapon_! Idiot.

He gave his only weapon to Dean, in order to make sure that he would be safe. While Dean appreciated the concern and all – and he _really_ did, don't get him wrong – it was also kind of a double-edged thing, because now Dean was worried about _Cas_. He didn't care how tough Cas was; you didn't fly into a fight against a stronger opponent with nothing to back you up. _This is what happens when you care about people... Them and their stupid heroic ideas make you bat-shit crazy._

As much as Sam and Bobby were trying to distract Hadraniel by pinging him with lead, Dean knew that Cas wasn't gonna win the battle without a little bit of help. So he did what he could: every chance that he got an opening, he was swiping at the bastard with the only thing that could kill him. He felt a visceral sort of satisfaction when one particular strike that he got in was deep enough for the light of Hadraniel's Grace to seep through. Hitting at the angel while avoiding _getting_ hit – as well as trying to keep outta Cas' way – was taking a bit more finesse than Dean had originally thought.

He was pulling himself back up off the ground _again_ when he saw something that made his blood go cold. Hadraniel had one massive hand wrapped around Cas' neck, holding him up in the air so that his feet were dangling with no purchase. That wasn't the part that particularly worried him though; he was pretty sure that Cas wasn't _capable_ of suffocating.

It was when Hadraniel moved his other hand to the space of air over Cas' left shoulder, seemingly grabbing at nothing, that the bottom dropped out of Dean's stomach. The agonized scream that escaped Cas as his brother yanked on an invisible wing was one of the most horrible things Dean had ever heard… Only to be out done by the distinct snapping sound that came out of nowhere as Hadraniel obviously splintered the hard ridge of bone that would have been at the top of the wing. _Mother FUCKER!_

Reacting on instinct, Dean launched his aching body forward. Landing hard onto Hadraniel's back, he wrapped an arm around the bastard's neck to keep his balance on the taller form. He didn't stop to think about the fact that this was probably a ridiculously _stupid_ idea, or that it was probably gonna end up with him in a world of pain… The only thought running through Dean's head was that he _needed_ to do something, _anything_, to get the larger angel to stop hurting his friend.

As soon as Hadraniel had registered Dean's weight on his back, he dropped Cas unceremoniously to the ground and began reaching over his shoulder to grab the hunter. Deciding not to give him the chance to royally _kick his ass_, Dean thrust forward with the Angel Blade, putting all of the strength that he had left into the motion. The heavenly sword went clean through the large torso, appearing on the other side in the centre of Hadraniel's chest. Pulling the blade back out, Dean dropped heavily back down to the ground, panting for breath.

The was a moment of stillness as the larger angel seemed to process just what had gone on, before a golden light began to burn from the wound, his eyes, and his mouth all at the same time. There was a horrible screaming as Hadraniel's true voice burst out, making all three of the humans scramble to cover their ears.

The body of Hadraniel's vessel slumped to the ground as the light disappeared, black ash littering the grass beneath it in the shape of massive wings.

* * *

Sam was breathing heavily, regaining his footing after the battle that had just gone on. His attention was drawn a moment later when out of the corner of his eye he saw Dean wincing in pain while crawling on hands and knees the few feet to where Castiel still lay. Sam figured that from the amount of hits Dean had taken from the massive angel, he was probably sporting some painfully broken ribs. Hell, he was probably lucky if that's _all_ that his brother escaped from the fight with.

Sam stilled in surprise when he turned his attention to Castiel, though. Their angelic friend was laying on one side in the grass, panting heavily in agony and his vessel's body covered in a sheen of sweat. He was twitching slightly, and Sam didn't need to be told how much pain he was probably in. As much as the more mundane injuries had no affect on angels, he imagined that a wound to their true forms – like a broken wing – was probably _excruciating_.

"Cas!" Dean croaked out of an obviously dry throat as he reached the angel's side. "Cas come on, man… Tell me what to do. I know it hurts, okay? How do we fix it? How do I make it better?" Dean's voice was desperate, the same kind of desperation as when Sam had taken a knife to the back all those years ago.

Sam and Bobby both watched in a surreal sort of helplessness as the elder Winchester gently tugged the unresponsive angel into a sitting position, Cas' head falling forward to rest on Dean's shoulder as he struggled with his pain.

"It's a broken wing…" Cas ground out through clenched teeth, Dean's hands gripping his upper arms probably the only reason he was even still upright. "I will survive, Dean. I merely need some time to heal."

"Okay…" Dean breathed out. "Okay. How do we get you back to Bobby's? I mean… You can't exactly zap us over there with a bum wing, right?" Castiel tiredly waved a hand in a direction off to their right without raising his head from Dean's shoulder, and Sam turned to look. _Oh… holy shit. _

"I can see the salvage yard from here." He told his brother, and saw him let out a sigh of relief.

"Alright, so we'll hoof it." He said decisively. "Sammy, c'mere and give me a hand." Sam crouched down at Castiel's other side, trying to be gentle when lifting the angel's arm to rest on top of his own; he wasn't exactly sure if moving his arms and back too much would hurt Castiel's wing or not.

He and Dean both stood, pulling Cas up with them and gripping him by the arms. Cas was a bit too short compared to the Winchesters, so trying to put his arms over their shoulders would be a bit more of a hindrance than anything. Instead, they held him from under his forearms so that the angel could push down on them to hold himself upright.

Having gotten themselves settled in this way, Bobby took point with his shotgun as they began a rather lengthy walk back to their safe-house. Castiel looked like he was struggling to remain conscious – which that in itself was an entirely new thing – and Sam had to worry about what was to come. _I mean… Broken bones usually need to be set to heal properly, right? Would it work that way for a broken wing?_

The answer was 'yes', as Sam found out when they finally got back to Bobby's.

* * *

"Dude…" Dean began, kneeling beside Bobby's old couch where Cas was laid out. "How am I supposed to set a freakin' bone that I can't _touch_?" Cas' skin was still kind of clammy, and _way_ paler than Dean had ever seen it before. Worry was gnawing at his gut, and he wasn't sure just what it was that Cas expected him to do.

"You _will_ be able to." Cas insisted through teeth clenched against the pain. "Close your eyes… All of you. Don't open them, no matter what." Dean didn't comply right away, instead taking a moment to stare at Cas. He could see in those impossibly blue eyes that Cas was dead serious, and that this was the only way the hunter was gonna be able to help him.

A second after his eyes closed, the room filled with so much light that all Dean could see was red from the back of his eyelids. Reaching out a cautious hand, he blindly searched for Cas' injured wing, startling a little when the angel moved it into his outstretched grasp. It was a surreal sensation… feeling the feathers and hard jut of bone, but being unable to see them. Instead, Dean pictured in his mind's eye the black wings that Cas had sported in their forest library.

Using that image as a reference point, he trailed his fingertips lightly up the wing until he could feel a spot at the top of the wing where the shape of the bone under his fingers didn't match up with the image in his head. Murmuring an apology when he felt Cas flinch from his touch, Dean leaned closer in order to put a hand on either side of the break.

"You ready?" He asked, swallowing nervously.

"…Please." Cas panted, and Dean decided that he never wanted to hear the angel beg again in his life. Taking a deep breath, he mentally counted to three.

Jerking both of his hands in a swift move, the two pieces of bone snapped back into place with a sickening crack, drawing a quickly suppressed whimper of pain from Cas. Dean could feel one of the angel's hands grip by his hip, the fingers twisting into the fabric of Dean's t-shirt as Cas obviously tried to ride out the agony he felt. Wanting to help, Dean blindly ran a hand down the rest of the wing, smoothing ruffled feathers down flat in much the same way that you would stroke a sick child's hair.

After a moment, the wing disappeared from Dean's touch and the room went dark. Knowing that this meant Cas had put his wings back to wherever-the-hell it was that they went when they were invisible, Dean blinked open his eyes and tried to clear the spots dancing in his vision. Cas wasn't panting for breath anymore, but Dean didn't think he'd ever seen him look so… well, _sick_. It was kind of creeping him out; he wasn't used to seeing a fully-grown Cas so… vulnerable. He didn't like it.

"Just… lay here and get some rest. Okay, buddy?" He said, not really knowing what else to do. Cas' fingers un-knotted from their grip in his shirt, and the angel tucked his arms in close to his chest where he laid. Nodding his head slightly, Cas' eyes closed in tiredness. Deciding to leave him to rest, the three of them escaped to the kitchen.

"Well…" Sam began, looking a bit like he had been brained by something. "That was… different." Dean huffed out a laugh, but there wasn't any real humour in it.

"I'll be perfectly happy if we _never_ have to do this again." He said as Bobby handed him a mug of coffee.

"So what should we do while Castiel rests?" Sam asked, a slight frown pulling in between his brows.

"I got somethin' fer the two of you to do." Bobby interjected, and Dean raised a brow.

"What's that?" He asked, curious despite the tiredness that was dragging at him now that the whole ordeal was over.

"You two idjits are goin' out ta buy me a new goddamn table."


	9. Chapter 9

Sam didn't think that he'd ever seen his big brother so far into mother-hen mode. Over the years, he'd gotten used to Dean pulling the whole _I'm the older brother, and I'll take care of everything_ card, and in the more recent Baby-Cas era he'd gotten a glimpse into the kind of Mom/Dad hybrid that the older Winchester was capable of. But this… This was something completely new.

For the last two days, Cas had been pretty out of it with only occasional bouts of consciousness while his Grace or whatever tried to heal his broken wing. It also seemed that Castiel was back to that close-to-human mode, as the majority of his angelness was working on healing himself. And Dean had been there the whole time.

If Cas woke up and needed water for a dry throat, Dean was there with one. If Cas started thrashing in his sleep, Dean was there to hold him still out of worry that he would somehow hurt himself. One time, Castiel woke up screaming loud enough to bring the three hunters running in the middle of the night. Sam and Bobby had watched somewhat helplessly (because, really… How many times have _you_ heard of an angel having a nightmare?) but Dean had just jumped into the fray, shaking Cas slightly to wake him up, and then rubbing his back quietly until the angel feel asleep again.

Sam didn't quite know what to think of it; as far back as he could remember, _he_ had always been the closest thing to a best friend that Dean had ever known. Because of their dad, they'd spent almost every waking second together, until Sam had left for school. But now…

Looking at it logically, Sam had known for a while that there was some kind of special… _thing_… between Dean and Cas. Their 'profound bond' or whatever. And it made sense to him, really. Because when you thought about it, Castiel had battled his way through Hell, his only purpose to find and raise Dean. That kind of intense focus had obviously affected the angel, playing a hand in the unwavering loyalty that he now felt for the older Winchester. And, the reverse could also be seen: as much as Sam and the others had tried to have Dean's back over the years, he was usually more of the _I'll save my own ass_ type. So Dean had never _really_ had someone looking out for him at quite the same level as Castiel did before.

Sam could tell, just by watching them. Cas had been trained his entire existence to be a good little foot-soldier, but now he was _Dean's_ foot-soldier. Dean had convinced himself through his whole life that the only one he could really count on was _himself_ (and Sam didn't begrudge him that, really… He'd known all along that his leaving for school had been a kind of betrayal in Dean's eyes). But now, Dean had _Cas_ to rely on.

And rely on him, he did. Cas was necessary to Dean now, and it was pretty easy for anyone with eyes to see. Cas was Dean's best friend, Cas was Dean's back-up in a fight, Cas was Dean's go-to guy for things he didn't understand, Cas was _family_. And Dean had always been the type to do anything required of him and beyond for his family.

Take that moment, for instance. Dean had finally passed out for a few minutes of sleep, sitting on the floor beside the couch that Castiel slept on, with his head tilted back and just resting against the angel's shoulder. Shaking his head with the kind of smile that Dean would kick his ass for if he were awake, Sam grabbed the old and tatty blanket from the back of a chair and quietly spread it over his brother.

Chuckling lowly to himself, Sam decided that he'd go catch some shut-eye in the bed upstairs.

* * *

"Yours or mine?" Dean asked, glancing around at their forest library in curiosity. It seemed that lately it didn't matter _whose_ head they were in; the scenery was always the same.

"I'm not sure…" Cas replied with that little puppy head-tilt, a frown scrunching in between his brows. Shrugging the matter off, Dean tapped him on the shoulder with the back of his hand.

"Doesn't matter," He said flippantly, making Cas' freakishly blue eyes zero-in on him. "let's go."

"Go where?" Cas asked, sounding even more confused. Rolling his eyes, Dean pointed upwards.

"To the branch, man. I'm not frigging climbing it today, so bust those wings out and get to work." Just after the demand left his lips, Dean paused. "Actually… C'mere for a minute." Pulling Cas by his rolled shirt sleeve, the hunter spun him around so that he had a better view of Cas' dream-wings.

He wasn't sure if an injury in real-life would actually show up here or not, but he figured it didn't hurt to look. The angel glanced back with an irritated frown and a twitch of his sensitive wings as Dean buried his fingers in feathers, searching out where the break should have been.

"Do you mind?" Cas asked dryly, a small glint of humour coming into his eyes. Dean glanced back up at his face, some heat creeping into his cheeks.

"I just wanted to see if you had your injury in here too…" He explained a little uncomfortably. Cas' eyes still seemed to be laughing at him, and Dean forced himself to get over any potential embarrassment and just friggin' _ask_. Clearing his throat awkwardly, he pushed the question out in a rush. "Is it like some kind of kinky taboo thing for someone else to get a hand on your feathers?" He could feel his face getting even redder when Cas just stared at him in surprise. "… 'Cause, if I've been unintentionally feeling you up this whole time, it would have been awesome to have been _told_ that."

Then the strangest thing happened. Cas _laughed_. Full-throated, out loud, no mistaking it, _laughed_. Dean could feel the feathers still under his hands ruffle up with the angel's mirth, and unconsciously smoothed them down in reaction, which seemed to have the effect of calming _Cas_ down.

When Dean had first heard Cas laugh – when that dick Zachariah had transported him to the 'future' – the sound had sent chills down his spine; it had been the strung-out slightly crazy laughter that came with a lot of desperation and a lot of drugs… There hadn't been a single thing _happy_ in the noise, and it had just about killed Dean to see it coming out of his angel. But this laughter… This had been the absolute _definition _of happiness, and it made Dean smile back at him.

"No," Cas finally gasped out, his laughter trailing off. "It's nothing like that." Dean relaxed into the knowledge that he hadn't been accidentally feeling-up his best friend this whole time, and instead got curious.

"What, then? I remember the first time I asked, you got your 'weirded out' face on." He said. Cas turned to face him, a smile still twitching at the corner of his lips. The angel wrapped his arms tightly around Dean's waist, and at first Dean thought that Cas was just hugging him, until he felt a tug and then a lack of ground beneath his feet.

* * *

As they settled onto their usual branch, Castiel contemplated his charge's inquiry. Dean settled himself back against the trunk of the tree, his slightly larger body needing the extra support to keep its balance. Castiel twitched his wings into a more comfortable position before explaining.

"Angels do not typically let just anyone touch their wings, Dean." He instructed, and the hunter's face frowned in confusion.

"Then why did you let me?" He asked. Castiel shrugged, a very human gesture that he had somehow adopted from the two Winchesters in his time with them.

"At first, your request had thrown me off, I admit. But then I had figured that the wings in this place are not technically _real_, so what would be the harm?" Dean didn't seem very pleased with that response, but didn't say anything about it.

"But what about – y'know – _out there_?" He asked, gesturing vaguely off in the distance, but Castiel knew he meant in the waking world. "You let me touch them to set the bone for you out there."

"It was necessary out there; the bone _needed_ to be set." This response did not seem to please the hunter any more than his previous one did. "You are upset." He observed, and a slow flush of red tinted the larger man's cheeks.

"I am not!" Dean disagreed hotly, but the blush did not abate. Realization came upon Castiel suddenly, making him want to smile.

"Rest assured, Dean. Outside of some of my Brothers, you are the only one that I would allow to touch them. Certainly, you are the only _human_." The tenseness in Dean's shoulders disappeared, though the expression on his face was still uncomfortable.

"Why?" He asked carefully. "Why me?" Castiel pondered his question with a frown, trying to understand why the hunter would have asked such a thing.

"You are my friend, Dean." He replied, but it didn't seem to be satisfactory to the older Winchester.

"Sam's your friend too."

"You are… _more so_ my friend. More than Sam. He and I do not share such a – "

"… 'Profound bond'?" Dean finished for him, with some humour lighting his face.

"Yes." Castiel answered simply.

"So, what you're saying is… I'm more awesome than Sam." It was said as more of a statement than a question, but Castiel answered him nonetheless, a ghost of smile upon his face.

"Yes. In my eyes, you are." Dean nodded, as if this statement finally met with his approval.

"You're awesome in my books too, Cas." He stated, and Castiel did not complain when Dean's large hand reached out to smooth down feathers ruffled in happiness.

They remained there for some time, sitting on their branch or strolling around the forest library while conversing with each other. It was quite a nice way to pass the night, in the angel's opinion.

* * *

Dean groaned a little in pain when he was yanked out, mid conversation, because something woke him up. It must have been the numbness in his ass, as he had apparently fallen asleep on the floor beside where Cas was laid out on the couch.

"Don't you two make such a sweet picture." A droll British voice sounded in the quiet room, jerking Dean into complete wakefulness. Blinking his eyes rapidly to clear them, he glared at Balthazar where he was seated in one of the office chairs.

"Shut up." He growled ineffectually, as Balthazar just laughed at him.

"Come, darling. Kiss your wife awake and join the rest of us in the kitchen." Dean flipped him off for the 'wife' comment, but promptly turned to wake Cas anyways. The angel's bright blue eyes blinked open slowly, reminding Dean a bit of his time as a baby. He wisely kept his humour to himself, since Cas was full-grown and probably able to smite people again.

"C'mon man, you're dick of a Brother is here." He said instead, and watched Cas quickly come to full-alertness.

"Which one?" He asked in his gravelly voice, the comment making Dean laugh.

"Good question." He replied instead, helping to haul Cas to his feet. His humour disappeared when he saw the grimace of pain that crossed the angel's expression. "Still that bad?" Cas' only answer was to nod, and he started to slump sideways. Dean's hunter reflexes kicked in, catching the smaller man easily before he went down.

"I believe I require some assistance." Cas said, sounding uncomfortable and refusing to meet Dean's eyes. He knew that an all-powerful being like Cas wouldn't feel too great about being so weak and needing help… Hell, Dean himself usually reacted that way, and he was just a lowly human. So instead he just nodded, and placed Cas' hand on his shoulder while he wrapped a supportive arm around the angel's waist.

"We can go slow, alright?" He said, and Cas nodded in understanding. The limped their way awkwardly into the kitchen, and Dean saw that Sam and Bobby were already in there with the smarmy angel. Balthazar eyed them up, smirking at the close position but for once keeping his comments to himself.

"So I gather that you lads solved the mystery and restored dear Castiel, since he appears to be quite larger than when I was here last." He said flippantly instead. Dean rolled his eyes at the obviousness, but held his tongue when he saw Balthazar frown. "Why is he still injured?" He asked, a true note of concern ringing through his tone. Balthazar took a step forward, but Dean turned them so that he was in between the older angel and Cas.

"Dude, he's hurting. Don't touch him." Balthazar only raised a brow at Dean's protective tone, but it was Cas that spoke up.

"Dean." Was all he said, but it was the tiredness in his voice that caught the hunter's attention. Turning to look at Cas, he took a few minutes to stare into pleading eyes. Just as he had when Cas was in baby-mode, Dean knew exactly what he wanted without the angel having to say a word.

"Alright, alright." He relented, helping Cas sit down in one of the chairs at the kitchen table, and backing up a couple steps. That's all Balthazar was getting, though… Dean wasn't moving any further away than that. The older angel threw him a dismissive glance before stepping to just behind Cas' back.

"Who set this bone, Castiel?" He asked, apparently able to see the wings that Dean knew were there but invisible to the rest of them.

"I did." He answered shortly, before Cas could even open his mouth. Balthazar's eyes popped in genuine shock for a moment, before narrowing at him in speculation.

"Well, well…" Was all he said, before turning back to examine Cas' hidden wings. When the smarmy dick reached a hand out to Cas' back, Dean twitched and had to physically stop himself from grabbing his arm.

Balthazar rested a hand at the base of Cas' neck, where it met his shoulders, and suddenly a muted blue light was glowing where their skin met. Dean frowned as Balthazar closed his eyes, seemingly in concentration for whatever he was doing. The hunter's tense shoulders didn't ease until a sigh of obvious relief escaped Cas' lips, and the pained frowned disappeared from the angel's brow.

* * *

"What'd you do?" Sam asked curiously, as Balthazar stepped away from Castiel. Sam could tell in one glance that the smaller angel seemed to be doing much better.

"I used some of my Grace to finish the healing process." He replied simply, but Sam knew instinctively that one angel expending Grace to help another wasn't that common of a thing. His eyes narrowed over it.

"Why would you do that?" He asked suspiciously, seeing that Dean was too preoccupied in studying Cas' face to make sure he was alright to ask himself. Balthazar shrugged a little, but reached out to gently flick some of Cas' wayward hair off his forehead and out of his face. It was an oddly… _human_ thing for Balthazar to have done.

"He _is_ my brother." The older angel replied simply. Sam noticed that he seemed uncomfortable with the affection that he felt for Castiel, though. The younger Winchester had to figure that despite his time on earth, there were still some human emotions that Balthazar just wasn't used to.

Deciding to push the moment to the side, the brothers and Bobby quickly filled Balthazar in on what all had happened. He didn't seem _too_ surprised, obviously having begun to put some of it together on his own, but Sam was gratified to hear the cursing that came from his very British voice when they related _which_ of the angels it had been that attacked Cas.

"How in the bleeding hell did you _survive_?" He asked incredulously, obviously knowing the sheer _size_ of Hadraniel's vessel, let alone the power the higher angel had held. But at the question, Dean just smirked in that irritating way of his.

"Hey, man… Don't underestimate the little ones. Besides, Cas had us." He stated simply, and Sam realized – not for the first time – the truth of the statement. Castiel _did_ have them, now. Cas was a part of their little rag-tag family, and to be honest, Sam just couldn't picture them functioning without the strangle little angel anymore. Somehow, Castiel had made himself a Winchester, in every sense of the dubious title.

Sam had a small moment of amusement during their discussion when Castiel became a bit agitated, and had Dean reached out to calm him down. Dean's hand had still been about a half-foot away from Castiel's back when he'd begun to lower it, and the momentary shock on his brother's face when his hand met empty air was priceless. It was as if his brother had been expecting _something_ to have been there behind Castiel's back for him to touch, but was startled when his hand met with nothing.

Sam watched a sheepish look come over Dean's face as he realized his mistake. He was pretty sure that he was the only one even paying attention to his brother's movement, as Cas was still facing away from Dean and arguing with Balthazar, and Bobby had turned to the counter to fetch coffee only a few moments beforehand.

Continuing to watch Dean out of curiosity, he noticed that Dean wrapped a hand around the back of Castiel's neck – obviously for lack of his _intended_ target, which Sam suspected had been wings that weren't there – and was a bit surprised when the touch seemed to calm the angel down instantly. _Interesting._ His thoughts were brought to halt at the question Cas asked next, the smaller man's attention focused down now instead of up in Balthazar's direction.

"Is this a new table?"

* * *

**The End.**


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